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THE  BEACON   BIOGRAPHIES 

EDITED    BY 

M.  A.  DEWOLFE  HOWE 


ULYSSES  S.  GRANT 

BY 

OWEN  WISTER 


ULYS  S  E  S    S.    GRANT 


OWEN  WISTER 


BOSTON 

SMALL,   MAYNARD  fif  COMPANY 
MDCCCCI 


t  EC12. 


Copyright,  1900 
By  Small,  Maynard  &?  Company 

{Incorporated) 

Entered  at  Stationers'  Hall 

First  edition  (7,000  copies),  December,  I  goo 
Second  edition  (2,000  copies'),  February, 


Press  of 
George  H.  Ellis,  Boston 


The  frontispiece  to  this  volume  is  from 
a  photograph  taken  in  1865  by  H.  F.  War 
ren,  and  now  in  the  collection  of  the  Bos- 
tonian  Society  in  Boston.  The  present 
engraving  is  by  John  Andrew  &  Son,  Bos 
ton. 


513433 


To  M.  C.  W 
from 

o.  w. 


PEEFACE. 

This  short  book  is  derived  from  long 
ones  ;  from  pamphlets,  speeches,  essays,  and 
newspapers;  from  certain  pages  of  the 
official  records ;  and  from  a  few  personal 
memories  kindly  given  by  friends  of  General 
Grant  to  the  writer.  These  latter  change 
nothing  in  the  features,  but  serve  to  touch 
up  the  likeness,  of  the  established  portrait. 
Grant  is  a  large  figure  to  pack  in  a  small 
box:  the  task  has  been  one  of  omission. 
Those  authors  to  whom  the  writer  is  most 
grateful  are  Richardson,  Fiske,  Coppee, 
Porter,  Humphreys,  Sherman,  Sheridan, 
Newhall,  Ehodes,  and  Badeau  ("  Grant  in 
Peace").  The  writer  will  think  that  he 
has  made  his  own  contribution  to  the  subject 
if  he  shall  have  tempted  any  reader  to  be 
come  more  thoroughly  acquainted  with  it. 

o.  w. 

PHILADELPHIA,  August  1,  1900. 


CHBOXOLOGY. 

1822 

April  27.  Hiram  Ulysses  [Ulysses  Simp 
son]  Grant  was  born  at  Point  Pleasant, 
Clermont  County,  Ohio. 

1823 

His  family  removed  to  Georgetown, 
Brown  County. 

1839 
Entered  West  Point. 

1843 

Graduated  twenty-first  in  a  class  of 
thirty-nine,  and  reported  for  duty  as 
brevet  second  lieutenant,  Fourth  In 
fantry,  at  Jefferson  Barracks,  near  St. 
Louis. 

1845 

October  1.  Full  second  lieutenant,  Seventh 
Infantry,  at  Corpus  Christi,  Texas. 

1846 
May  8.  His  first  battle,  Palo  Alto.     His 


xii  CHEOM)LOGY 

second  the  following  day  at  Eesaca  de  la 

Palma. 

September    21-23.    Gallant    conduct    at 

Monterey. 

1847 

March  29.  Was  at  Yera  Cruz  under 
General  Scott. 

April  18.  Was  in  battle  of  Cerro  Gordo, 
and  August  20  in  those  of  San  Antonio 
and  Churubusco.  Regimental  quarter 
master. 

September  8.  Brevetted  first  lieutenant 
for  gallant  and  meritorious  conduct  at 
Molino-del-Eey. 

September  12-13.  Was  in  battle  of  Cha- 
pultepec. 

September  13.  Brevetted  captain  for  gal 
lant  conduct  at  Chapultepec. 
September  16.  Full  first  lieutenant. 

1848 

August  22.  Married  Julia  B.  Dent,  of  St. 
Louis. 

Was  stationed  at  Detroit  and  Sackettfs 
Harbor. 


CHBONOLOGY  xiii 

1852 

June.  Ordered  to  Pacific  Coast. 
September.  Stationed  at  Columbia  Bar 
racks  (Fort  Vancouver). 

1853 

August  5.  Full  captain. 
October.  Stationed  at  Fort  Humboldt. 

1854-1861 

July  31,  1854.  Eesigned  from  the  army, 
and  was  in  civil  life  first  at  St.  Louis 
and  finally  at  Galena,  Illinois. 

1861 

April  18.  Was  made  chairman  of  a  meet 
ing  at  Galena  to  raise  volunteers.   Yainly 
sought  a  commission  in  the  army  until 
June  16.  Was  appointed  colonel  of  the 
Twenty-first  Illinois  Volunteers. 
August  7.    Brigadier-general  of  volun 
teers,  dating  from  May  17. 
September  4.  Occupied  Cairo. 
September  6.  Occupied  Paducah. 
November  7.  Was  defeated  at  Belmont. 


xiv  CHBONOLOGY 

1862 

February  16.  Captured  Fort  Donelson. 
Promoted  to  the  grade  of  major-general 
of  volunteers. 

April  6-7.  Fought  the  battle  of  Shiloh. 
October  3-5.  Commanded  engagements  at 
Corinth. 

December  20.  His  first  failure  against 
Vicksburg  precipitated  by  the  capture 
of  his  base  at  Holly  Springs. 

1863 

January  30.  Assumed  command  opposite 
Vicksburg. 

February-April.  Attempted  various  routes 
to  invest  Vicksburg. 
April  30.  Crossed  to  the  Vicksburg  side 
of  the  river. 

May  1.  Battle  of  Port  Gibson. 
May  7.  Cut  loose  from  his  base  of  sup 
plies  at  Grand  Gulf. 
May  12.  Battle  of  Eaymond. 
May  14.  Battle  of  Jackson. 
May  16.  Battle  of  Champion's  Hill. 


CHEONOLOGY  xv 

1863  (continued) 
May  19.  Vicksburg  invested. 
July  4.  Vicksburg  surrendered  to  him. 
Major-general  United  States  Army. 
November  24-25.  Won  the  battle  of  Chat 
tanooga. 

1864 

March  2.  Bank  of  lieutenant-general  re 
vived  for  him. 

May  5-6.  Fought  Lee  in  the  battle  of 
the  Wilderness  and 
May  8-21.  Battle  of  Spottsylvania. 
May  23-26.  Battle  of  North  Anna. 
May  3l-June  12.  Battle  of  Cold  Harbor- 
July-November.  Operations  round  Peters 
burg. 

1865 

April  1.  Battle  of  Five  Forks. 
April  3.  Pursued  Lee  after  the  fall  of 
Eichmond. 

April  6.  Battle  of  Sailor's  Creek. 
April  9.    Eeceived    Lee's   surrender  at 
Appomattox  Court-house. 


xvi  CHRONOLOGY 

1866 
July  25.  Eank  of  general  given  to  him. 

1867-8 

August  12-January    14.  Was  Secretary 
of  War  ad  interim. 

1868 

May  19.    Was    unanimously   nominated 
for  President  at  the  National  Eepublican 
Convention  in  Chicago. 
November.    Was    elected    by  214    votes 
to  80. 

1872 

September  14.  Settlement  of  the  Alabama 
claims. 

November.  Ee- elected  President  by  300 
votes  against  66. 

1877 

May  17.  Sailed   from    Philadelphia  on 
his  journey  round  the  world. 

1879 

December  16.  Landed    at    Philadelphia 
from  his  journey. 


CHKONOLOGY  xvii 

1883 
December  24.  Was  injured  by  a  fall. 

1884 

May  6.  Failure  of  the  Marine  Bank  and 
of  Grant  &  Ward. 
November.  Final  illness  declared  itself. 

1885 

March  4.  Was  placed  on  the  retired  list 
with  the  rank  of  general. 
July  23.  Ulysses  S.  Grant  died  at  Mount 
McGregor,  near  Saratoga,  New  York. 


ULYSSES  S.  GRANT 


ULYSSES    S.    GRANT. 

I. 

AT  the  age  of  thirty -nine,  Grant  was 
an  obscure  failure  in  a  provincial  town. 
To  him  and  his  family,  for  whom  he 
could  not  earn  needful  bread,  his  father 
had  become  a  last  shelter  against  the 
struggle  for  life.  Not  all  the  neighbours 
knew  his  face.  At  the  age  of  forty- 
three  his  picture  hung  in  the  homes  of 
grateful  millions.  His  name  was  joined 
with  Washington's.  A  little  while,  and 
we  see  him  step  down,  amid  discordant 
reproach,  from  Washington's  chair,  hav 
ing  helplessly  presided  over  scandal  and 
villany  blacker  than  the  country  had 
thus  far  witnessed.  Next,  his  private 
integrity  is  darkly  overcast,  and  the 
stroke  kills  him.  But  death  clears  his 
sky.  At  the  age  of  sixty-three,  Grant 
died  ;  and  the  people  paused  to  mourn 
and  honour  him  devotedly.  All  the 
neighbours  know  his  face  to-day. 


II. 

NONE  of  our  public  men  have  a  story 
so  strange  as  this.  It  is  stranger  than 
Lincoln's.  It  is  very  much  the  strangest 
of  them  all.  We  have  been  too  near  the 
man  and  his  time  to  see  them  clear 
through  personal,  political,  and  military 
feelings,  mostly  violent.  All  the  people 
are  not  dead  yet.  Nearly  all  the  writers 
have  a  case  to  argue.  Sheridan  must 
justify  his  treatment  of  "Warren.  Sher 
man  must  bolster  up  Shiloh.  Beaure- 
gard  must  diminish  Sidney  Johnston. 
Badeau  must  belittle  Meade,  and  also 
the  losses  in  the  Wilderness.  These  are 
mere  instances.  The  heroes  and  their 
biographers  all  write  alike,  inevitably 
moved  and  biassed  by  the  throb  of  prox 
imity.  Such  books  are  not  history. 
They  make  inspiring  material,  when 
read  in  each  other's  light.  They  are 
personal  reminiscences.  History  never 
begins  until  reminiscence  is  ended. 


ULYSSES   S.   GKANT  3 

Even  Mr.  Bopes,  in  his  championing  of 
Buell  the  soldier,  omits  Buell  the  man. 
Now  Buell,  sulking  over  his  wrongs, 
declined,  when  invited,  to  come  back  and 
take  a  command  again.  He  found  his 
dignity  more  important  to  him  than  the 
Union.  Grant,  meeting  singular  injus 
tice  after  winning  Donelson,  has  such 
words  as  these  to  say  :  "If  my  course  is 
not  satisfactory,  remove  me  at  once.  I 
do  not  wish  to  impede  in  any  way  the 
success  of  our  arms."  Good  authority 
rates  Buell  a  more  military  soldier  than 
Grant,  and  very  likely  he  was.  But 
Buell  thought  of  himself  and  forgot  his 
country,  while  Grant  thought  of  his 
country  and  forgot  himself.  Out  of  this 
very  contrast  a  bright  light  falls,  and  we 
begin  to  see  Grant.  Writing  intemper- 
ately,  his  friends  explain  him  as  a  sort 
of  Napoleon ;  his  enemies,  as  a  dull 
blunderer,  accidentally  reaping  the 
glory  which  other  people  sowed.  These 
extremes  meet  in  error.  We  have  not 


4  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

produced  a  Napoleon,  and  military  tal 
ents  of  greater  brilliancy  than  Grant's 
fought  on  both  sides.  Purely  as  cap 
tains,  Lee,  Jackson,  Sherman,  Thomas, 
if  not  others,  are  likely  to  stand  higher  ; 
while  Sheridan  during  his  brief  oppor 
tunity  proved  such  a  thunderbolt  that, 
did  history  know  men  by  their  promise 
instead  of  by  their  fruits,  he  might  out 
shine  the  whole  company,  and  rank  with 
Charles  of  Sweden  or  Conde. 

Yet  Grant  sits  above  and  apart.  Is 
this  accident  ?  Is  it  accident  that  at  the 
beginning  of  a  certain  four  years  this 
middle-aged  man  should  be  nobody,  and 
at  the  end  should  be  the  one  commander 
out  of  all  to  win  and  retain  the  supreme 
confidence  of  his  government  and  his 
people  ?  It  has  been  called  accident  by 
some  grown- up  writers.  His  own  words 
give  the  unconscious  explanation:  "I 
feel  as  sure  of  taking  Eichmond  as  I  do 
of  dying."  Not  McClellan,  not  Meade, 
not  Lincoln  himself,  not  any  one  at  all, 


ULYSSES   S.  GBANT  5 

had  ever  been  able  to  feel  as  sure  as 
that.  This  utter  certainty  of  the  Union' s 
success  burned  in  Grant  like  a  central 
fire,  and,  with  all  his  limitations,  made 
his  will  a  great  natural  force  which  grav 
itated  simply  and  irresistibly  to  its  end. 
Lincoln,  beginning  to  feel  it  from  afar, 
answered  the  grave  complaints  that  rose 
after  the  carnage  of  Shiloh:  "I  can't 
spare  this  man  :  he  fights. "  And  pres 
ently,  during  the  impatient  days  of  Vicks- 
burg  failures,  he  insists:  "  I  rather  like 
the  man.  I  think  we'll  try  him  a  little 
longer."  Finally  conies  the  renowned 
remark,  when  they  tell  him  of  Grant's 
intemperance:  "I  wish  I  knew  what 
brand  of  whiskey  he  drinks.  I  would 
send  a  barrel  to  all  my  other  generals." 
Sherman  felt  the  power  near  at  hand,  as 
he  fought  under  Grant,  and  wrote  to  him 
that  it  was  something  which  he  could 
liken  "to  nothing  else  than  the  faith  a 
Christian  has  in  his  Saviour. ' '  Through 
this  faith,  then,  the  obscure  man  from 


6  ULYSSES   S.  GEAOT 

Galena  began  in  April,  1861,  and  by 
April,  1864,  was  the  will-power  of  his 
country. 

But  why  was  such  a  man  still  obscure 
at  the  age  of  thirty-nine?  Again  his 
own  words  give  the  fundamental  expla 
nation  :  "As  I  grow  older,  I  become 
more  indolent,  my  besetting  sin  through 
life.77  This  was  written  in  1873  to  his 
minister  to  England,  and  no  truer  word 
ever  came  from  him.  Together  with 
the  remark  about  taking  Eichmond,  it 
reveals  the  foundation  upon  which  the 
whole  man  was  built.  Great  will  and 
great  indolence  met  about  equally  in 
Grant ;  therefore  he  stood  still,  needing 
a  push  from  without  to  move  him.  The 
gun  that  fired  on  Sumter  was  the  push. 
Until  that  day  he  resembled  a  large 
animal  hibernating.  To  what  he  did 
and  left  undone  his  other  qualities  con 
tributed  ;  but  these  two  controlled, — in 
dolence  and  will.  In  their  light  his 
story  can  be  plainly  read,  his  portrait 
clearly  seen. 


m. 

VARIOUS  ardent  pens  have  attempted 
to  embellish  Grant's  boyhood.  He  has 
even  been  given  illustrious  descent.  It 
is  enough  to  know  for  certain  that, 
Scotch  in  blood  and  American  since 
1630,  he  was  of  the  eighth  generation, 
and  counted  a  grandfather  in  the  Bevo- 
lution,  besides  other  soldier  ancestors. 
The  first  Grant,  Matthew,  probably 
landed  at  Nantucket,  Massachusetts,  May 
30,  1630.  In  1636  he  helped  establish 
the  town  of  Windsor,  Connecticut.  He 
was  its  first  surveyor  and  a  trusted 
citizen.  Samuel,  Solomon,  Noah,  Adon- 
iram,  that  is  what  the  Grants  in  colonial 
Connecticut  were  called.  And  with 
such  names  as  these  they  did  what  all 
the  other  colonial  Noahs  and  Adonirams 
were  doing.  None  of  them  rose  to  un 
common  dimensions  ;  but  they,  and  such 
as  they,  were  then,  as  they  are  now,  the 
salt  and  leaven  of  our  country.  After 


8  ULYSSES   S.  GRANT 

the  Revolution,  as  our  frontier  widened 
and  the  salt  and  leaven  began  to  be 
sprinkled  westward,  Captain  Noah 
Grant  went  gradually  to  the  Ohio  River, 
leaving  there  no  riches  and  many  chil 
dren.  One  of  these,  Jesse,  became  a 
tanner,  and  in  1821  married  Miss  Han 
nah  Simpson  from  Pennsylvania. 

On  April  27,  1822,  at  Point  Pleasant 
on  the  Ohio  River,  twenty-five  miles 
above  Cincinnati,  was  born  their  eldest 
son,  and  christened  Hiram  Ulysses, — 
Hiram  because  his  grandfather  liked  the 
name,  Ulysses  because  his  step-grand 
mother  had  been  reading  Fenelon.  Sev 
enteen  years  later,  when  the  boy  was  ap 
pointed  to  the  Military  Academy,  "Mr. 
Hamer,  knowing  Mrs.  Grant's  name  was 
Simpson,  and  that  we  had  a  son  named 
Simpson,  somehow  got  the  matter  a  little 
mixed  up  in  making  the  nomination, 
and  sent  the  name  in  Ulysses  S.  Grant." 
Such  is  the  father's  narrative.  And 
before  leaving  Grant's  plain,  self-reliant, 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  9 

uncommercial  ancestry,  of  which  his  own 
character  is  such  a  natural  and  relevant 
product,  let  it  be  noted  that  Jesse,  be 
sides  writing  good  clear  prose,  not  un 
like  his  son's,  could  turn  verses  fairly 
well,  and  also  that  a  neighbour  remarked 
of  Ulysses  that  he  "got  his  sense  from 
his  mother. "  As  to  Ulysses  and  the 
congressional  error  in  his  name,  he  never 
succeeded  in  correcting  it.  The  conse 
quences  were  that  the  boy  came  vari 
ously  to  be  known  as  Lyssus,  Lys,  Use 
less,  Uncle  Sam,  and  Unconditional  Sur 
render.  His  whole  story  is  here  written 
in  nicknames. 

Grant's  boyhood  is  like  his  ancestry, 
—  wholesome,  pastoral,  inconspicuous. 
With  a  rustic  schooling,  a  love  of  the 
woods,  a  preference  for  idleness,  and  an 
affinity  for  horse  flesh,  his  recorded  words 
and  deeds — save  one  —  might  be  those 
not  of  a  thousand,  but  a  million  Ameri 
can  boys.  He  repeated  "  a  noun  is  the 
name  of  a  thing  .  .  .  until  I  had  come 


10  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

to  believe  it,"  so  he  says  himself. 
"When  I  was  seven  or  eight  years  of 
age,  I  began  hauling  all  the  wood  used  in 
the  house  and  shops.  .  .  .  When  about 
eleven  years  old,  I  was  strong  enough  to 
hold  a  plough.  From  that  age  until 
seventeen  I  did  all  the  work  done  with 

horses While  still  quite  young,  I  had 

visited  Cincinnati,  forty-five  miles  away, 
several  times  alone.  ...  I  did  not  like  to 
work ;  but  I  did  as  much  of  it  while 
young  as  grown  men  can  be  hired  to  do 
in  these  days,  and  attended  school  at  the 
same  time.  .  .  .  The  rod  was  freely  used 
there,  and  I  was  not  exempt  from  its  in 
fluence."  This  steadfast,  manly,  not 
bright  boy  had  quiet  grey-blue  eyes,  a 
strong,  straight  nose,  straight  brown 
hair,  and  a  bulky  build.  His  under 
standing  of  horses,  and  the  manner  in 
which  he  was  successfully  trusted  with 
them  on  overnight  journeys  while  still  a 
child,  bear  witness  to  the  tough  fibre  of 
responsibility  and  courage  in  him.  Nor 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  11 

was  lie  pugnacious,  but  rather  the  re 
verse  ;  and  this,  too,  helps  a  portrait  of 
the  boy  from  which  the  features  of  the 
man  seem  a  natural,  slow  development. 
It  would  be  strangely  inconsistent  to 
find  in  Grant's  adolescence  any  signs  of 
precocity,  such  as  mark,  for  example, 
the  early  years  of  Webster,  another  rustic 
boy  with  very  similar  antecedents.  For 
intellect  was  Webster's  gift,  while  char 
acter  was  Grant's ;  and  character  finds 
no  outward  expression  save  in  life's 
chances.  Napoleon  owes  his  fame  to 
himself,  but  Wellington  owes  his  fame  to 
Napoleon  ;  and,  save  for  the  Civil  War, 
Grant's  force  would  have  slumbered  in 
him  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave. 

Here  is  the  single  prophetic  incident. 
It  has  been  told  in  many  ways ;  and  his 
own  is  the  best,  as  usual :  — 

"  There  was  a  Mr.  Ealston  .  .  .  who 
owned  a  colt  which  I  very  much  wanted. 
My  father  had  offered  twenty  dollars  for 
it,  but  Ealston  wanted  twenty-five.  I 


12  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 

was  so  anxious  to  have  the  colt  that .  .  . 
my  father  yielded,  but  said  twenty 
dollars  was  all  the  horse  was  worth,  and 
told  me  to  offer  that  price.  If  it  was  not 
accepted,  I  was  to  offer  twenty- two  and  a 
half,  and,  if  that  would  not  get  him,  to 
give  the  twenty-five.  I  at  once  mounted 
a  horse,  and  went  for  the  colt.  When  I 
got  to  Mr.  Balston's  house,  I  said  to 
him,  Papa  says  I  may  offer  you  twenty 
dollars  for  the  colt,  but,  if  you  won't 
take  that,  I  am  to  offer  twenty-two  and 
a  half ;  and,  if  you  won't  take  that,  to 
give  you  twenty-five." 

He  was  eight  when  this  happened  j 
and  when,  after  all  his  vicissitudes,  he 
came  to  die,  the  same  native  candour  and 
guilelessness,  like  truth  at  the  well's 
bottom,  shone  unclouded  in  his  heart. 
No  experience  of  deceit  seems  to  have 
cured  him  of  this  inveterate  simplicity 
or  warned  him  that  others  did  not  pos 
sess  it.  "  Grant  believes  every  one  as 
honest  as  himself,"  was  said  of  him  dur- 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  13 

ing  later  days  of  struggle.  Is  it  wonder 
ful  that  he  failed  in  each  business  vent 
ure?  When  he  was  elected  President, 
such  a  combination  of  firmness  and  in 
tegrity  was  an  outlook  which  naturally 
filled  the  politicians  with  dismay.  They 
could  not  foresee  that  it  would  prove  a 
door  wide  open  to  every  dollar  which 
they  plotted  to  steal.  When  not  far 
from  his  end,  he  was  asked  if  such  and 
such  a  thing  had  not  distressed  him,  and 
replied,  "No,  nothing  but  being  de 
ceived  in  people. "  And  this  sorrow 
ful  thought  haunts  the  preface  to  his 
memoirs.  Yes,  that  old  horse  story  is 
an  omen.  It  raises  laughter,  to  be  sure  ; 
but  change  the  figure  of  farmer  Balston, 
getting  his  undue  price  through  the 
boy's  guilelessness,  into  Belknap  of  the 
Fort  Sill  and  national  cemetery  scandals, 
into  Babcock  of  the  whiskey  ring,  into 
Jay  Gould  of  Black  Friday,  into  Ferdi 
nand  Ward,  the  final  thief  who  crossed 
Grant's  credulous  path,  and  the  old  horse 
story  grows  less  mirthful. 


14  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 

His  bringing  up  was  evidently  strict. 
Both  his  talk  and  life  were  pure.  He 
seems  to  have  got  on  without  swearing, 
even  in  battle, — as  extreme  a  sign  of 
calm  force  as  can  be  imagined.  Even 
Washington  broke  out  at  Monmouth 
Court-house.  Grant's  one  weakness, 
drinking,  has  therefore  been  the  more 
conspicuous.  But  in  these  early  days 
at  Georgetown,  Ohio  (where  the  family 
moved  soon  after  his  birth),  he  seems  to 
have  been  soberer  than  many  in  that  re 
gion.  As  for  an  army  career,  not  only 
had  it  never  entered  his  head  to  be  a 
soldier,  but  he  was  averse  to  the  notion 
when  suggested  to  him  by  his  father. 
"  A  permanent  position  in  some  respect 
able  college/'  he  writes,  was  his  hope, 
even  after  entering  West  Point.  "I 
had  no  intention  of  remaining  in  the 
army."  Indeed,  in  closely  studying 
Grant's  temperament,  it  almost  seems  as 
if  he  were  not,  in  the  last  analysis,  a  sol 
dier,  but  a  patriot  compelled  to  fight. 


ULYSSES  S.  GEASTT  15 

Like  poets,  the  world's  great  captains 
are  born,  not  made.  The  art  of  war, 
war  for  war's  sake,  struck  no  spark  in 
Grant.  But  he  brought  to  its  practice  a 
sagacity  and  a  grip  of  such  dimensions 
as  (after  some  experience)  to  serve  as 
the  equivalents  of  genius  and  instruc 
tion.  This  is  sometimes  cited  to  point 
the  demagogic  moral  that  education  is 
"un- American. "  Ben  Butler  in  his 
book  says:  " Grant  evidently  did  not 
get  enough  of  West  Point  in  him  to  hurt 
him  any.  .  .  .  All  the  graduates  in  the 
higher  ranks  in  their  classes  never  came 
to  anything."  Now  Robert  E.  Lee 
graduated  second.  It  took  four  years 
and  some  half-dozen  generals  to  beat 
him.  But  Butler's  book  would  be  a 
joke,  were  it  not  a  stench. 

When  Grant  was  near  seventeen  he 
told  his  father  that  he  would  never  do  a 
day's  work  at  tanning  after  twenty -one. 
The  sensible  Jesse  saw  no  success  for 
him  there,  if  his  heart  was  not  in  it,  and, 


16  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 

asking  what  would  he  like,  was  told 
farming  or  trading  or  to  get  an  educa 
tion.  He  had  no  farm  to  give  his  son 
nor  money  to  send  him  to  college,  and 
but  a  poor  opinion  of  a  trader's  life  on 
the  Mississippi.  But  West  Point  offered 
free  education  and  subsequent  honour 
able  service.  The  father  settled  the  ques 
tion  ;  and  this  is  the  son's  account  of  it : 
"  Ulysses,  I  believe  you  are  going  to  re 
ceive  the  appointment. —  What  appoint 
ment?  I  inquired. —  To  West  Point. 
I  have  applied  for  it. —  But  I  won't  go, 
I  said.  He  said  he  thought  I  would  j 
and  I  thought  so,  too,  if  he  did."  The 
Italics  are  Grant's  own,  and  he  seldom 
uses  them.  Since  his  career  is  offered 
as  an  inspiration  to  American  youth,  it 
is  a  pity  that  his  bringing  up  so  rarely 
serves  as  a  model  for  American  parents. 
A  sound,  sturdy  wholesomeness  in  both 
father  and  mother  is  the  assisting  cause 
of  most  that  was  admirable  in  their  son. 
They  made  no  grief  over  saying  good-by. 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  17 

But  across  the  street  a  friend  and  her 
daughter  did  ;  and  the  boy  exclaimed, 
"  Why,  you  must  be  sorry  I  am  going. 
They  didn't  cry  at  our  house.7'  At 
that  house,  however,  during  a  period 
of  the  Mexican  War  when  the  absent 
son  could  not  write  home,  the  mother's 
hair  grew  grey. 

Local  opinion  of  Congressman  Hamer's 
choice  was  not  flattering.  "I  am  as 
tonished  that  he  did  not  appoint  some 
one  with  intellect  enough  to  be  a  credit 
to  the  district,"  said  a  neighbour  to  the 
cadet's  father ;  and  no  special  achieve 
ment  during  those  four  years  of  study 
contradicts  this  view.  The  boy  gradu 
ated  twenty-first  in  a  class  of  thirty- 
nine,  good  in  mathematics  and  excellent 
in  horsemanship.  But  —  and  here  again 
is  the  dimly  felt  moral  fibre — he  was 
often  umpire  in  disputes ;  and  he  was 
greatly  liked  by  his  friends,  who  called 
him  Uncle  Sam.  "  Indeed,  he  was  a 
very  uncle-like  sort  of  a  youth,'7  writes 


18  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

a  comrade,  Henry  Coppee.  "His  pict 
ure  rises  before  me  ...  in  the  old  torn 
coat,  obsolescent  leather  gig-top,  loose 
riding  pantaloons,  with  spurs  buckled 
over  them,  going  with  his  clanking  sabre 
to  the  drill-hall.  He  exhibited  but  little 
enthusiasm  in  anything. "  Here  is  testi 
mony  to  that  mental  indolence,  or  tor 
por,  which  pervaded  his  nature  ;  and  he 
gives  more  himself.  l  i  I  rarely  read  over 
a  lesson  the  second  time.  ...  I  read  all 
of  Bulwer's,  .  .  .  Cooper's,  Marryat's, 
Scott's,  Washington  Irving' s  works, 
Lever's,  and  many  others  that  I  do  not 
now  remember. ' '  His  letters  home  show 
an  appreciation  of  natural  scenery,  and 
this  he  seems  always  to  have  had. 

During  his  furlough  at  home  after  two 
years  at  the  Academy  it  is  narrated  by 
Eichardson  that,  ' l  in  accordance  with  an 
agreement  between  himself  and  class 
mates  to  abstain  from  liquor  for  a  year, 
he  steadily  refused  to  drink  with  his  old 
friends.  The  object  of  the  cadets  was  to 


ULYSSES  S.  GRANT  19 

strengthen,  by  their  example,  one  of 
their  number  who  was  falling  into  bad 
habits.77  It  has  never  been  narrated 
that  C.  F.  Smith,  the  commandant  of 
cadets,  sent  for  the  boy  once  when  he 
was  in  danger  of  being  dismissed,  and 
told  him  that  he  was  capable  of  better 
things.  The  words  that  passed  on  this 
occasion  have  died  with  the  two  that 
spoke  them  j  but  Grant  loved  and 
honoured  Smith  with  a  special  feeling, 
and  a  great  deal  lies  behind  the  short 
sentence  in  the  second  chapter  of  the 
memoirs.  So  West  Point  bears  consist 
ent  witness  to  the  good  and  the  bad  in 
Grant.  He  left  it  in  1843,  wishing 
naturally  to  be  a  dragoon,  but  was  com 
missioned  brevet  second  lieutenant  in 
the  Fourth  Infantry,  to  which  he  re 
ported  for  duty  on  September  30  at 
Jefferson  Barracks,  Missouri. 


IV. 

HE  was  twenty-one,  and  five  feet 
seven  inches  high,  but  bulky  no  longer. 
A  threatening  cough  had  reduced  him 
to  one  hundred  and  seventeen  pounds, — 
his  weight  four  years  earlier,  though  he 
had  grown  six  inches.  For  a  time  his 
hours  were  fairly  free  ;  and  he  made  the 
acquaintance  of  a  classmate's  sister,  Miss 
Julia  Dent,  living  in  the  neighbour 
hood.  When  Texas  and  Mexican  affairs 
called  his  regiment  to  Louisiana  in  the 
following  May,  he  found  that  he  re 
garded  Miss  Dent  as  more  than  an  ac 
quaintance  ;  and  they  became  engaged. 
Before  the  end  of  the  month  he  was  in 
camp  near  the  Eed  Eiver  on  high 
ground,  so  healthy  that  they  named  it 
Camp  Salubrity ;  and  presently  he  was 
cured  of  his  cough,  and  developed  a 
reddish  beard  that  is  described  as  being 
much  too  long  for  such  a  youth.  Gen 
eral  Eichard  Taylor,  of  the  Confederacy, 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  21 

remembers  him  at  this  time  as  "a 
modest,  amiable,  but  by  no  means  prom 
ising  lieutenant  in  a  marching  regi 
ment."  But  Taylor  could  scarcely  have 
held  this  estimate  after  Molino- del-Bey 
and  Chapultepec.  In  the  months  of 
peace  preceding,  whether  in  Louisiana 
or  at  Corpus  Christi,  Grant's  thoughts 
still  saw  the  goal  of  a  professorship  ;  nor 
was  his  heart  in  the  Mexican  War,  when 
it  came.  He  pronounces  it  "unholy," 
and  he  writes  :  "The  Southern  Bebell- 
ion  was  largely  the  outgrowth  of  the 
Mexican  War.  Nations,  like  individ 
uals,  are  punished  for  their  transgres 
sions.'7  This  forty  years'  retrospect  is 
consistent  with  his  letter  after  Cerro 
Gordo :  "You  say  you  would  like  to 
hear  more  about  the  war.  .  .  .  Tell  them 
I  am  heartily  tired  of  the  wars." 

On  the  intellectual  side,  his  letters 
read  stark  and  bald  as  time-tables. 
Mexico,  Cortez,  Montezuma,  are  noth 
ing  to  him.  But  his  constant  love  of 


22  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 

nature  leads  him  to  remark  and  count 
the  strange  birds  of  the  country  j  and  he 
speaks  of  the  beauty  of  the  mountain 
sides  covered  with  palms  which  "toss  to 
and  fro  in  the  wind  like  plumes  in  a 
helmet.7'  This  poetical  note  rings  so 
strangely  in  the  midst  of  his  even,  mat 
ter-of-fact  words  that  one  wonders,  did 
he  not  hear  some  one  else  say  it,  and 
adopt  it  because  he  thought  it  good! 
It  was  his  habit  to  do  this.  It  is  thus 
that  many  years  later  the  famous  "bot 
tling  up'7  of  Butler  came  to  be  so  de 
scribed. 

Yet,  though  his  heart  was  not  in  this 
war,  he  shone  in  its  battles.  He  was  in 
all  fights  that  he  could  be  in,  and  in 
several  that  he  need  not  have  been  in. 
For  after  the  capture  of  Yera  Cruz  he 
was  appointed  regimental  quartermas 
ter  ;  and  this  position  puts  an  officer  in 
charge  of  the  trains,  and  furnishes  him 
with  a  valid  reason  for  staying  behind 
with  them.  Grant  never  did,  however, 


ULYSSES  S.  GRANT  23 

but  was  always  in  the  thick  of  the 
action.  He  was  commended  in  reports, 
brevetted  first  lieutenant  for  distin 
guished  service  at  Molino-del-Eey  (but 
deaths  in  that  battle  brought  him  full 
first  lieutenancy),  and  for  "  acquitting 
himself  most  nobly ' 7  at  Chapultepec  he 
received  the  brevet  of  captain.  Yet 
these  honours  do  not  show  him  so  much 
out  of  the  common  as  what  quietly  hap 
pened  between  him  and  General  Worth 
at  San  Cosme.  He  had  found  a  belfry 
which  commanded  an  important  posi 
tion  of  the  enemy  j  and  to  the  top  of 
this  he,  with  a  few  men,  had  managed 
to  get  a  mountain  howitzer.  Presently 
General  Worth  observed,  and  sent  a 
staff  officer  for  him  —  Pemberton,  of 
Yicksburg.  Worth  "  expressed  his 
gratification  at  the  services  the  howitzer 
in  the  church  steeple  was  doing,  .  .  .  and 
ordered  a  captain  of  voltigeurs  to  report 
to  me  with  another  howitzer.  ...  I 
could  not  tell  the  general  that  there 


24  ULYSSES   S.  GBANT 

was  not  room  enough  in  the  steeple  for 
another  gun,  because  he  probably  would 
have  looked  upon  such  a  statement  as  a 
contradiction  from  a  second  lieutenant. 
I  took  the  captain  with  me,  but  did  not 
use  the  gun."  Here  in  his  prompt  and 
perfect  sagacity  stands  the  future  Grant 
quite  plain. 

Thus  ends  this  chapter  of  his  life, 
and  in  it  he  may  be  said  to  have  hit  the 
mark.  His  careless  dress  and  modesty 
had  not  entirely  hidden  the  man  be 
neath  them.  And  now  follows  a  dark 
ening  time,  in  which  he  misses  the  mark 
altogether.  War  had  forced  him  to 
exert  himself.  When  war  stopped,  he 
stopped  also.  His  ease-loving  nature 
furnished  no  inward  ambition  to  keep 
him  going  j  and  so,  in  the  dead  calm 
of  a  frontier  post,  he  degenerated.  This 
drifting  and  stagnation  filled  thirteen 
years,  but  is  not  long  to  tell. 

In  July,  1848,  he  left  Mexico  for  Mis 
sissippi  with  his  regiment.  He  was  a 


ULYSSES   S.   GKANT  25 

brevet  captain,  and  twenty-six  years 
old.  In  August  lie  was  married.  As 
quartermaster,  the  regiment's  new 
headquarters  at  Detroit  should  have 
been  his  post  that  winter  ;  but  a  brother 
officer,  ordered  to  Sackett's  Harbor,  pre 
ferred  the  gayety  of  Detroit,  and  man 
aged —  one  sees  the  thing  to-day  often 
enough  —  to  have  Grant  sent  to  Sack- 
ett's  Harbor,  and  himself  made  acting 
quartermaster  at  Detroit.  This  mean 
ness  was  righted  by  General  Scott  in  the 
spring  ;  and  in  later  days  Grant,  having 
the  chance  to  even  things  with  the 
brother  officer,  did  not  take  it,  but 
stood  his  friend.  In  June,  1851,  Sack- 
ettfs  Harbor  became  regimental  head 
quarters  ;  and  Grant  was  there  for  twelve 
months,  when  he  was  ordered  to  the 
Pacific  by  way  of  the  Isthmus.  On  ac 
count  of  her  health,  Mrs.  Grant  did  not 
go  with  him.  He  passed  the  next  year 
on  the  Columbia  River,  at  what  is  now 
Fort  Vancouver,  where  he  was  both  post 


26  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

and  regimental  quartermaster.  One 
last  year  lie  spent  as  captain  of  F  Com 
pany,  Fourth  Infantry,  at  Humboldt 
Bay.  Then  he  left  the  army,  resigning 
July  31,  1854. 

Such  were  his  moves  and  removes. 
Of  his  doings  the  tale  is  equally  brief. 
He  was  known  for  his  exploits  with 
horses.  Otherwise  he  was  unknown 
save  to  the  very  few  brought  by  chance 
or  duty  into  familiarity  with  him.  To 
provincial  blood  and  environment  he 
added  an  extraordinary  personal  power- 
lessness  to  express  himself  or  go  through 
his  manners.  In  fact,  he  had  no  man 
ners,  which  is  far  better  than  having 
bad  ones,  to  be  sure  ;  and  a  certain 
something  in  him  seems  to  have  held 
even  the  most  familiar  at  a  distance. 
But  even  Georgetown  and  Galena  found 
him  wanting ;  and  this  social  dumbness 
did  not  wholly  wear  off  until  he  had 
been  twice  President  and  had  travelled 
round  the  world. 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  27 

Either  great  strain  or  great  ennui 
may  drive  a  strong,  resourceless  man  to 
drink  j  and  both  at  different  times 
visited  Grant,  and  overcame  him.  It 
has  been  plainly  written,  but  is  seldom 
remembered,  that  his  head  in  these  days 
was  singularly  light :  a  strange  thing  in 
such  a  temperament,  but  well  authenti 
cated.  Very  little  was  too  much  for 
him.  Never  to  touch  liquor  was  his 
only  safety. 

Mow  he  left  the  army  is  conflictingly 
told.  He  could  scarcely  be  expected  to 
explain  it  himself.  It  is  only  the 
Franklins  and  the  Eousseaus  who  can  be 
as  impersonally  candid  as  that.  Eich- 
ardson's  version  closely  tallies  with 
what  is  still  reported  on  the  coast. 
Grant's  commandant  asked  for  his  resig 
nation,  which  was  not  to  be  forwarded 
to  Washington,  but  held  in  escrow,  so 
to  speak,  that  he  might  pull  himself  to 
gether.  He  could  not,  and  the  plain 
truth  is  that  he  drank  himself  out  of  the 
army. 


28  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

He  departed  into  an  era  that  was  to 
be  one  of  deepening  gloom,  remarking, 
"Whoever  hears  of  me  in  ten  years 
will  hear  of  a  well-to-do  old  Missouri 
farmer.77  Expecting  money  at  San 
Francisco,  he  did  not  get  it.  Sixteen 
hundred  dollars  were  also  owed  him  by 
the  post-trader  at  Vancouver.  He  saw 
the  man  again,  but  the  dollars  never. 
The  chief  quartermaster  of  the  coast 
found  him  penniless  and  forlorn,  and 
helped  him  to  go  East.  In  New  York 
he  was  generously  helped  by  Buckner, 
who  had  ascended  Popocatapetl  with 
him.  In  the  autumn  he  is  seen  working 
as  a  labourer  on  his  father-in-law's  farm 
near  St.  Louis.  With  his  own  hands  he 
builds  a  cabin  on  some  of  this  land,  and 
names  it  "Hardscrabble."  It  is  re 
corded  that  every  animal  about  his  farm 
was  a  pet.  In  1858  he  sold  his  farm  at 
auction.  He  went  into  real  estate,  and 
next  into  the  custom-house,  and  was 
even  an  auctioneer,  it  is  said.  Some- 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  29 

times  army  friends  came  to  visit  Mm, 
for  he  retained  their  regard  j  and,  with 
overalls  tucked  in  his  boots,  he  would 
dine  with  them  at  the  Planter's  House. 
Personally  lonely,  he  was  also  out  of 
sympathy  with  St.  Louis  politics ;  and 
although  the  events  of  the  world  had  at 
length  begun  to  stir  his  strong  brains, 
and  he  had  opinions,  not  only  about 
slavery,  but  also  about  the  Italian  war, 
and  studied  maps  and  newspapers  mi 
nutely,  his  comments  were  received  with 
indulgence  ;  for  his  audience,  looking  at 
the  man,  could  scarcely  look  for  wisdom 
from  him. 

There  came  a  time  when  he  walked 
the  streets,  seeking  employment.  So 
painful  was  it  all  that  those  who  knew 
him  preferred  to  cross  the  street  rather 
than  meet  him.  Can  any  one  gauge  the 
despair  of  a  man  who,  little  as  he  stud 
ied  himself,  must  have  known  how  far 
below  himself  he  was  living? 

In  March,  1860,  Grant  went  to  weigh 


30  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 

leather  and  buy  hides  for  his  father's 
branch  store  in  Galena.  He  was  paid 
six  hundred  dollars  at  first,  and  later 
eight  hundred.  But  th'is  did  not  sup 
port  his  wife  and  four  children.  He 
went  to  the  war  in  debt,  which  he  paid 
from  his  first  military  savings.  In  1866 
he  refused  his  inheritance,  saying  that 
he  had  helped  to  make  none  of  his 
father7  s  wealth.  This  must  be  remem 
bered  in  considering  Grant's  acceptance 
of  presents  in  acknowledgment  of  his 
military  services. 

The  year  at  Galena  was  more  than 
ever  isolated.  His  quiet  judgment, 
however,  seems  to  have  been  wide 
awake.  He  went  to  hear  Douglas  dur 
ing  the  campaign  of  this  year,  and, 
being  asked  how  he  liked  him,  answered, 
"  He  is  a  very  able,  at  least  a  very  smart 
man."  And  from  having  been  a  Demo 
crat —  so  far  as  he  was  definitely  any 
thing  political  —  his  change  of  view 
dates  from  this  occasion.  The  words 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  31 

of  Douglas  caused  him  to  rejoice  over 
Lincoln's  election.  Except  his  vote 
for  Buchanan,  his  single  political  man 
ifestation  previous  to  this  had  been 
to  join  the  Know-Nothings  at  St. 
Louis,  and  attend  one  meeting.  But 
now  he  had  listened  to  Douglas,  and 
preferred  Lincoln ;  and  South  Carolina 
had  seceded.  The  state  of  the  country 
became  his  one  thought.  It  is  interest 
ing  to  reflect  that  South  Carolina,  the 
first  state  to  leave  the  Union,  sent  one 
man  in  thirty -eight  to  the  Ee  volution, 
while  Grant's  ancestral  state,  Connect^ 
cut,  furnished  one  man  in  seven,  or  five 
times  as  many.  Virginia  furnished  one 
in  twenty-eight. 


V. 

ON  Friday,  April  12,  1861,  news 
reached  Galena  that  South  Carolina  had 
fired  upon  Fort  Sumter.  On  Monday 
came  tidings  of  its  capture.  On  Tues 
day  there  was  a  town  meeting,  with  a 
slippery  mayor.  But  two  spirits  of  a 
different  quality  spoke  out.  "Wash- 
burne  said,  "Any  man  who  will  try  to 
stir  party  prejudices  at  such  a  time  as 
this  is  a  traitor."  Eawlins  ended  his 
fervent  speech,  "We  will  stand  by  the 
flag  of  our  country,  and  appeal  to  the 
God  of  battles."  These  two  names 
must  always  be  joined  with  Grant's  fort 
unes  ;  and  this  was  the  first  night  of 
their  common  cause.  Washburne  in 
Congress  became  Grant's  good  angel 
against  the  public,  and  Eawlins  in 
Grant's  tent  was  his  good  angel  against 
temptation  —  John  A.  Eawlins,  farmer, 
charcoal-burner,  self-educated  lawyer, 
"swarthy,  rough-hewn,  passionate,"  as 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  33 

Mr.  Garland  writes  of  him.  In  later 
years  Grant  said,  "I  always  disliked  to 
hear  anybody  swear  except  Eawlins." 
It  was  over  Grant's  whiskey  that  many 
of  these  oaths  were  raised  ;  and,  though 
we  have  heard  much  about  the  glasses 
which  he  drank,  we  shall  never  know 
the  tale  of  those  which  he  escaped 
drinking,  thanks  to  his  friend.  Grant 
kept  Eawlins  close  to  him  throughout 
the  war,  and  after  it  as  long  as  he  lived. 
His  loss  was  sorrowful  and  irreparable. 
At  the  end  of  the  town  meeting, 
Grant  told  his  brother  that  he  thought 
he  ought  to  go  into  the  service.  On 
Thursday  he  found  himself  chairman  of 
a  meeting  to  raise  volunteers.  After 
his  first  few  words  of  embarrassment,  he 
made  himself  plain  enough.  Though 
an  Abolitionist  by  no  means,  he  says  in 
a  letter  to  his  father-in-law  at  this  time, 
"In  all  this  I  can  see  but  the  doom  of 
slavery."  Believing  he  could  better 
serve  his  state  at  Springfield,  he  de- 


34  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 

clined  the  captaincy  of  a  volunteer 
company,  but  helped  them  form  and 
drill,  and  went  with  them  to  Springfield 
on  the  same  train.  But,  though  Wash- 
burne's  belief  in  him  was  already  con 
siderable,  his  influence  for  a  while 
wrought  nothing  in  the  chaos  of  in 
trigues  and  appointments.  As  the 
French  Colonel  Szabad  vividly  describes 
this  period  in  our  country:  "Never 
were  commanders  of  such  high  rank 
created  with  more  rapidity  and  less 
discernment.  Those  who  had  some 
knowledge  of  the  art  of  war,  as  well  as 
those  who  were  ignorant  of  its  first 
principles,  well-educated  and  intelligent 
men,  together  with  men  totally  illiterate 
and  vulgar,  all  received  their  stars  with 
an  equal  facility  j  and  all  alike  believed 
themselves  capable  of  leading  to  vic 
tory.77  Nor  is  this  a  supercilious  Euro 
pean  view.  "When  the  baggage  animals 
were  starving  at  Chattanooga,  Lincoln 
complained,  "I  can  make  a  brigadier- 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  35 

general  any  day  I  like,  but  these  mules 
cost  $150  apiece.''  In  the  vast  shuffle 
and  ferment,  then,  how  should  poor, 
silent,  unshowy  Grant  not  be  lost  ?  The 
marvel  is  that  he  was  found  so  soon.  It 
all  seems  as  casual  as  fate.  Tired  of 
waiting,  though  Washburne  counselled 
patience,  he  was  about  to  return  to 
Galena,  when  he  was  taken  into  the 
adjutant- general's  office  j  and  for  a  while 
he  sat  in  a  corner,  filling  blanks  with 
such  ease  and  naturalness  that  nobody 
noticed  it  was  well  done.  Next  he  was 
sent  for  a  few  days  to  Camp  Yates  while 
the  commandant  was  absent.  Force  was 
felt  in  him  here ;  and  he  was  one  of  the 
five  officers  appointed  to  muster  in  ten 
regiments  at  Mattoon.  It  was  called 
Camp  Grant.  But  none  of  this  led  to 
anything.  He  wrote  to  his  father,  "I 
might  have  got  the  colonelcy  of  a  regi 
ment  possibly  ;  but  I  was  perfectly  sick 
of  the  political  wire-pulling  for  all  these 
commissions,  and  would  not  engage 
in  it." 


36  ULYSSES   S.  GBANT 

While  mustering,  he  had  a  few  idle 
days  to  wait,  and,  finding  himself  near 
St.  Louis,  waited  there.  The  town  was 
a  pot  of  conspiracy.  Claiborne  Jackson, 
the  governor,  with  a  Union  mask  on, 
was  stealing  troops  and  arms  for  Seces 
sion.  Francis  Blair  and  Nathaniel 
Lyon,  two  most  competent  patriots, 
watched  him  through  his  mask.  At  the 
right  moment  they  captured  his  entire 
camp.  A  rebel  flag  which  had  been 
flying  in  St.  Louis  then  came  down  to 
stay  down.  Grant  looked  on  at  this, 
and  presently,  entering  a  street- car,  was 
addressed  by  a  youth  in  words  that  may 
be  dwelt  upon.  The  mouth  of  Ireland 
never  uttered  a  bull  more  perfect.  Se 
cession  never  drew  its  own  portrait  with 
a  straighter  stroke.  The  profound  self- 
contradiction  between  the  youth's  two 
sentences  has  placed  him  in  history. 
"  Things  have  come  to  a  damned  pretty 
pass,"  said  he,  "when  a  free  people 
can't  choose  their  own  flag.  Where  I 


ULYSSES   S.  GBANT  37 

came  from,  if  a  man  dares  to  say  a  word 
in  favour  of  the  Union,  we  hang  him  to 
a  limb  of  the  first  tree  we  come  to." 
In  Grant's  reply  the  spirit  of  the  Union 
is  likewise  drawn:  " After  all,  we  are 
not  so  intolerant  in  St.  Louis  as  we 
might  be.  I  have  not  seen  a  single  rebel 
hung  yet,  nor  heard  of  one.  There  are 
plenty  of  them  who  ought  to  be,  how 
ever." 

He  next  wrote  from  home  to  Wash 
ington  offering  his  services,  and  with 
some  hesitation  saying  that  he  felt 
himself  competent  to  command  a  regi 
ment.  No  answer  came.  He  went  to 
Cincinnati  to  see  General  McClellan,  but, 
failing  twice,  gave  this  up  too.  Of  his 
enforced  idleness  he  writes  May  30, 
"  During  the  six  days  I  have  been  at 
home  I  have  felt  all  the  time  as  if  a  duty 
was  being  neglected  that  was  paramount 
to  any  other  duty  I  ever  owed."  But 
now  the  troops  of  the  Twenty-first  Illi 
nois  had  become  insubordinate.  It  was 


38  ULYSSES   S.  GEANT 

a  regiment  which  he  had  mustered  at 
Mattoon  ;  and  it  would  appear  that  the 
officers,  dissatisfied  with  their  colonel, 
had  spoken  to  the  governor  of  Grant. 
The  governor  seems  to  have  been  puz 
zled.  Meeting  a  book-keeper  from  the 
Galena  store,  he  said  :  "  What  kind  of  a 
man  is  this  Captain  Grant  ?  .  .  .  He  .  .  . 
declined  my  offer  to  recommend  him  to 
Washington  for  a  brigadier -generalship, 
saying  he  didn't  want  office  till  he  had 
earned  it.7'  And  the  book-keeper  re 
plied,  "Ask  him  no  questions,  but 
simply  order  him  to  duty."  On  the  day 
when,  through  a  friend's  offices,  Grant 
had  received  the  commission  of  colonel 
of  an  Ohio  regiment,  Governor  Yates 
telegraphed  him  his  appointment  as 
colonel  of  the  Twenty-first  Illinois ;  and 
this  he  chose,  and  went  to  Springfield. 

There  is  a  story  that  he  was  intro 
duced  to  his  command  by  two  orators, 
who  both  burst  into  eloquence  and  rhap 
sodised  for  some  time.  His  turn  came, 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  39 

and  much  was  expected  from  him  j  but 
his  speech  was  this:  "Men,  go  to  your 
quarters."  They  presently  discovered 
that  they  had  a  colonel,  although  the 
colonel  had  no  uniform,  being  obliged  to 
go  home  and  borrow  three  hundred  dol 
lars  to  buy  him  horse  and  equipments. 

This  regiment  had  volunteered  for 
thirty  days ;  but,  after  listening  to 
McClernand's  and  Logan's  patriotic  ad 
dresses,  Grant  relates  that  they  entered 
the  United  States  service  almost  to  a 
man.  He  does  not  say  that  a  month 
later,  in  Missouri,  when  these  same  men 
whom  he  had  severely  disciplined  heard 
that  he  was  likely  to  be  promoted,  they 
requested  to  be  attached  to  his  com 
mand.  He  wrote  his  father  this ;  but 
he  adds  that  he  does  not  wish  it  read  to 
the  others,  "for  I  very  much  dislike 
speaking  of  myself." 

His  men  did  not  know  his  feelings  as 
he  drew  near  what  he  thought  was  to  be 
his  first  engagement.  He  writes:  "As 


40  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 

we  approached  the  brow  of  the  hill 
from  which  it  was  expected  we  would 
see  Harris' s  camp,  and  possibly  find  his 
men  ready  to  meet  us,  my  heart  kept 
getting  higher  and  higher,  until  it  felt 
to  me  as  though  it  was  in  my  throat ;  .  .  . 
but  the  troops  were  gone.  My  heart 
resumed  its  place.  It  occurred  to  me 
that  Harris  had  been  as  much  afraid  of 
me  as  I  had  been  of  him.  .  .  .  From  that 
event  to  the  close  of  the  war  I  never  ex 
perienced  trepidation  upon  confronting 
an  enemy,  though  I  always  felt  more  or 
less  anxiety.  .  .  .  The  lesson  was  valu 
able." 

Not  much  happened  to  Grant  in  Mis 
souri  ;  and  he  took  occasion  to  rub  up 
his  tactics.  "I  do  not  believe, "  he 
says,  "that  the  officers  of  the  regiment 
ever  discovered  that  I  had  never 
studied  the  tactics  that  I  used."  Very 
likely  the  officers  did  not  j  but  at  Shiloh 
the  enemy  discovered  that  no  earth 
works  had  been  thrown  up.  Somewhat 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  41 

later  than  this  Missouri  time  a  young 
associate  of  Grant's,  who  perhaps  plumed 
himself  a  little  upon  his  military  read 
ing,  asked  the  general  something  about 
Jomini' s  book.  Grant  replied,  with  a 
tinge  of  impatience,  that  he  had  read 
Jomini  without  much  attention  ;  and 
then  he  added  :  "The  art  of  war  is 
simple  enough.  Find  out  where  your 
enemy  is.  Get  at  him  as  soon  as  you 
can.  Strike  at  him  as  hard  as  you  can 
and  as  often  as  you  can,  and  keep  mov 
ing  on."  In  this  compact  summary 
speaks  the  master  mind.  But  the  enemy 
got  at  Grant  at  Shiloh,  and  a  little 
Jomini  would  have  helped  there.  Be 
fore  the  battle  of  the  Wilderness  he  is 
said  to  have  exclaimed  to  Meade,  "Oh, 
I  never  manoeuvre  ! ' '  And  it  is  said 
that  his  library  contained  not  a  single 
military  work.  Grant's  master  mind 
undoubtedly  did  learn  as  he  went  on; 
but,  if  books  had  taught  him  more  of  the 
experience  of  the  world's  generals,  he 


42  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 

would  not  have  had  to  acquire  so  much 
himself  at  the  cost  of  thousands  of  lives. 
Sherman's  own  letter  to  Grant,  March 
10,  1864,  hints  this,  but  with  the  indul 
gent  voice  of  friendship  :  "My  only 
points  of  doubt  were  as  to  your  knowl 
edge  of  grand  strategy  and  of  books  of 
science  and  history  j  but  I  confess  your 
common  sense  seems  to  have  supplied  all 
this. ' '  There  seems  no  doubt  that  Grant 
possessed  grand  strategy — and  none  that 
his  tactics  remained  weak  to  the  end. 

Common  sense,  indeed,  was  his  great 
weapon  ;  and  with  this  finally  came  the 
power  of  grasping  a  vast  conflict  of  si 
multaneous  facts,  and  instantly  forming 
the  right  judgment  of  what  he  must  do. 
Those  who  saw  him  for  the  first  time 
must  have  been  amazed  to  learn  the 
story  of  the  thirteen  torpid  years.  He 
supervised  the  rations,  the  equipment, 
the  transportation.  There  was  not  a 
material  need  or  detail  that  he  did  not 
thoroughly  foresee  and  attend  to.  An 


ULYSSES   S.  GEANT  43 

officer  serving  under  him  wrote  back 
to  Galena,  "This man  is  the  pure  gold." 
As  the  stress  of  experience  and  responsi 
bility  roused  him  more  and  more,  his 
brain  took  in  his  command  like  a  great 
multiplication  table.  From  the  efficiency 
of  the  private  as  a  unit,  how  much  he 
must  eat,  how  far  he  could  march,  what 
load  he  could  carry,  he  reckoned  and 
combined,  and  so  knew  what  aggressive 
strength  he  had  or  should  want  at  any 
given  time,  expressed  so  to  speak  in  foot 
pounds  of  soldiers.  Upon  this  material 
side  the  Mexican  War  was  a  great  help 
to  him  ;  and  upon  quite  another  side  he 
has  the  following  to  say:  "All  the 
older  officers,  who  became  conspicuous 
in  the  Eebellion,  I  had  also  served  with 
and  known  in  Mexico.  .  .  .  The  acquaint 
ance  thus  formed  was  of  immense  ser 
vice  to  me  in  the  War  of  the  Eebellion, — 
I  mean  what  I  learned  of  the  characters 
of  those  to  whom  I  was  afterwards 
opposed.  .  .  .  The  natural  disposition  of 


44  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

most  people  is  to  clothe  a  commander  of 
a  large  army,  whom  they  do  not  know, 
with  almost  superhuman  abilities.  A 
large  part  of  the  National  Army,  for  in 
stance,  and  most  of  the  press  of  the 
country,  clothed  General  Lee  with  just 
such  qualities;  but  I  had  known  him 
personally,  and  knew  that  he  was  mortal, 
and  it  was  just  as  well  that  I  felt  this." 
At  this  early  time,  however,  Grant 
thought  the  war  would  be  of  short  dura 
tion  ;  and  Lee  was  a  long  way  from  his 
presentiments. 

On  August  7,  1861,  while  still  in 
south-eastern  Missouri,  he  was  made 
brigadier-general,  to  his  own  great  sur 
prise.  Of  his  methods  of  discipline  soon 
after  this  appointment  a  singular  story 
is  told.  The  command  was  marching, 
and  food  was  scarce.  A  lieutenant  with 
an  advance-guard  reached  a  farm-house, 
and,  upon  informing  its  mistress  that  he 
was  General  Grant  and  was  hungry,  re 
ceived  a  precipitate  and  copious  meal, 


ULYSSES   S.  GEANT  45 

and  went  on  much  comforted.  Pres 
ently  Grant  himself  rode  to  the  same 
door,  and  asked  for  food.  "  General 
Grant  has  just  left  here,"  he  was  told, 
' f  and  has  eaten  everything. ' ?  "  Umph, ' ' 
said  Grant,  "  every  thing  ?"  A  pie  did 
remain  ;  and  for  this  the  general  gave 
the  woman  fifty  cents,  requesting  her  to 
keep  it  until  called  for.  Eiding  on  to 
camp,  he  ordered  grand  parade  at  once  ; 
and  to  the  astonished  assembly  the  act 
ing  assistant  adjutant- general  read  the 
following  order:  " Lieutenant  W.  of 
the  Indiana  Cavalry,  having  on  this 
day  eaten  everything  in  Mrs.  Selvidge's 
house,  at  the  crossing  of  the  Ironton  and 
Pocahontas  and  Black  Eiver  and  Cape 
Girardeau  roads,  except  one  pumpkin 
pie,  Lieutenant  W.  is  hereby  ordered 
to  return  with  an  escort  of  one  hundred 
cavalry,  and  eat  that  pie  also. ? >  Whether 
authentic  or  not,  the  story  is  very  like 
Grant  in  several  ways.  The  lieutenant 
could  have  been  with  propriety  severely 


46  ULYSSES  S.  GBAOT? 

punished  for  personating  his  commander. 
This  method,  however,  achieved  its  pur 
pose  thoroughly.  On  the  other  hand,  it 
may  be  doubted  if  General  Lee  would 
have  chosen  it.  There  is  great  difference 
between  native  refinement,  which  Grant 
had,  and  good  taste,  which  he  had  not. 

Insubordination,  however,  whether  in 
men  or  officers,  was  neither  the  only 
nor  the  chief  trouble  which  met  the  new 
brigadier-general.  It  was  something, 
moreover,  with  which  he  could  cope  so 
well  that  he  was  steadily  gaining,  not 
only  the  obedience,  but  the  regard  of  his 
command.  Another  thing  there  was 
against  which  he  was  quite  powerless. 
His  wary  quartermasterly  eye  watched 
a  ring  of  contractors  in  St.  Louis  too 
closely  for  their  convenience.  They 
could  do  what  they  liked  with  the  futile 
Fremont,  now  in  command  of  the  de 
partment  $  but  Grant  spoiled  their 
plans,  and  they  accordingly  revived  the 
story  of  his  drinking.  By  order  of  his 


ULYSSES   S.  GEANT  47 

surgeon  lie  had  taken  some  whiskey ; 
and  that  was  the  whole  of  it.  But  it  was 
enough.  General  Prentiss,  a  little  jealous 
about  rank,  departed  from  Grant's  juris 
diction,  saying,  "  I  will  not  serve  under 
a  drunkard."  The  slander  reached 
Washburne  through  the  newspapers  j 
and  he,  his  faith  in  Grant  already  great, 
but  not  yet  impregnable  as  it  soon  be 
came,  wrote  to  Eawlins.  Eawlins  an 
swered,  explaining  that  the  surgeon  had 
prescribed  whiskey  for  an  attack  of 
ague,  and  added  that,  much  as  he  loved 
Grant,  he  loved  his  country  more,  and 
if  at  any  time,  from  any  cause,  he 
should  see  his  chief  unfit  for  the  position 
he  occupied,  he  should  deem  it  his  duty 
to  report  the  fact  at  once.  "  Before 
mailing  the  letter,"  continues  Eichard- 
son,  "  he  handed  it  to  Grant.  The  gen 
eral,  who  had  suffered  keenly  from  these 
reports,  read  it  with  much  feeling,  and 
said  emphatically :  Yes,  that's  right, — 
exactly  right.  Send  it  by  all  means." 


48  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 

It  is  a  creditable  story  to  every  one  ex 
cept  Prentiss  and  the  contractors  ;  and 
it  reveals  Bawlins  in  a  bright  light.  No 
wonder  Grant  let  him  swear  whenever 
he  wanted. 

For  a  little  while  Grant  was  ordered 
about  hither  and  thither  in  Missouri ; 
but  there  is  nothing  decisive  to  record 
until,  soon  after  being  assigned  the  com 
mand  of  the  district  of  South-east  Mis 
souri,  he  took  up  his  headquarters  at 
Cairo  on  September  4. 

Here  he  stands  upon  the  threshold  of 
his  fame.  So  unpretending  a  figure 
does  he  make  that  a  first  sight  of  him 
perplexes  and  discourages  each  new 
comer.  Twelve  weeks  ago  he  had  been 
nothing.  Then  he  was  made  a  colonel. 
Now  he  was  a  brigadier-general  of  vol 
unteers.  One  summer  had  done  this ; 
but  it  had  done  as  much  for  half  a 
hundred  others.  So  here  was  quite  a 
large  company  with  even  chances.  But 
chance  and  the  man  are  rare  comrades. 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  49 

Like  many,  he  had  expected  this  war 
to  be  a  smaller  thing  than  our  cam 
paign  in  Mexico.  That  was  twenty -six 
months  ;  its  losses,  about  a  thousand  lives 
a  month  ;  its  cost,  one  hundred  and  sixty 
million.  The  Eebellion  lasted  forty- 
eight  months.  It  was  a  battle-ground 
somewhat  larger  than  England,  Scot 
land,  Ireland,  France,  Germany,  Spain, 
and  Portugal  put  together.  There  were 
eighteen  hundred  and  eighty -two  fights 
where  at  least  one  regiment  was  en 
gaged,  and  certain  battles  where  some 
hundred  and  fifty  thousand  men  were 
engaged.  The  losses  in  its  four  years 
come  to  seven  hundred  lives  a  day.  The 
cost  of  it  was  three  billion  four  hundred 
million,  or  about  two  and  a  half  million 
dollars  a  day.  Mr.  Saintsbury,  the 
eminent  English  critic,  has  called  this 
a  "  parochial  disturbance. "  Wolseley, 
the  conspicuous  English  general,  has  said 
that  an  army  of  fifty  thousand  trained 
soldiers  could  have  ended  the  matter  in 


50  ULYSSES   S.  GEAKT 

six  months.  But  this  military  man,  at 
that  time,  had  not  suppressed  the  Boers. 
Such  utterances  are,  of  course,  merely 
the  voice  of  English  petulance  that  our 
house,  when  divided  against  itself,  did 
not  fall.  United,  we  were  a  disagree 
able  competitor  for  England.  Moreover, 
the  Union's  triumph  might  affect  Eng 
land's  getting  Southern  cotton,  it  was 
feared ;  and  in  Lord  Eussell's  evasions 
over  the  Declaration  of  Paris,  and  in 
the  sailing  of  the  Alabama,  and  in  the 
welcome  which  London  gave  Benjamin 
(of  Davis' s  cabinet)  when  he  came  there 
to  live  after  the  war,  England's  hostile 
undertone  to  the  Union  speaks  out 
plainly.  We  had  friends  there:  the 
Prince  Consort,  and  through  him  the 
Queen ;  John  Bright  and  the  Manches 
ter  men.  But  the  rank  and  file  of  the 
aristocracy  were  full  of  virtuous  rage 
at  our  presuming  to  be  a  great  nation. 

No  more  than  Grant  does  Jefferson 
Davis  seem  to  have  looked  for  a  grave 


ULYSSES  S.  GRANT  51 

struggle.  He  and  the  few  leaders,  who 
took  the  South  into  Secession,  managed 
to  make  it  believe  that  "one  Southerner 
was  equal  to  five  Yankees."  And  Davis 
made  a  speech  in  which  he  announced 
that  he  was  ready  to  u  drink  every  drop 
of  blood  shed  south  of  Mason  and 
Dixon's  line."  This  line  across  our 
country  was  quite  seriously  thought  by 
Secessionists  to  divide  all  Americans 
geographically  into  heroes  and  cowards. 
This  tribal  mania  was  very  naturally 
heightened  by  the  performances  of  Gen 
erals  Butler  and  Schenck  and  the  rout 
of  Bull  Eun.  In  the  East  the  Union 
cause  looked  dark  enough,  when  light 
unexpectedly  came  from  the  West. 
General  Grant  stands  the  central  figure 
in  that  light. 

To  follow  him,  a  survey  of  the  country 
must  be  taken.  Through  the  gallant 
Lyon  and  Blair  and  Curtis  and  Pope, 
Secession  presently  lost  Missouri.  This 
made  safe  Illinois  across  the  river ;  for 


52  ULYSSES   S.  GKANT 

all  east  from  there  was  Union  to  the 
Atlantic.  But  just  south  came  doubtful 
Kentucky,  and  south  of  that  was  Confed 
erate  Tennessee ;  and  from  there  to  the 
Gulf  and  east  and  west  was  all  Seces 
sion.  Kentucky,  then,  was  the  first 
point ;  after  that,  the  great  river,  the 
highway  whose  gates  were  closed,  and 
which  ran  between  the  banks  of  Seces 
sion  all  the  way  to  New  Orleans  and  the 
Gulf.  Now  Kentucky,  like  Missouri, 
had  loyal  citizens,  but  a  Secession  gov 
ernor  j  and  it  was  the  part  of  the  South 
to  secure  this  state,  if  possible.  But  no 
sooner  did  General  Polk  with  that  aim 
move  upon  Columbus  on  the  river,  thus 
threatening  Cairo,  than  Grant  secured 
Cairo  himself.  The  Mississippi  was 
closed  from  Columbus  down.  If  Polk 
should  get  Paducah,  the  Ohio  would  be 
locked  up  too.  Grant  saw  this,  and,  tele 
graphing  the  futile  Fremont,  "I  am 
nearly  ready  to  go  to  Paducah,  and  shall 
start,  should  not  a  telegram  arrive  pre- 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  53 

venting  the  movement,"  waited  till 
night,  and  went.  He  took  Paducah 
without  firing  a  gun.  Through  his 
prompt  sagacity  the  Ohio  was  locked 
against  Polk.  He  now  wanted  to  "keep 
moving, ' >  according  to  his  view  of  war  ; 
but  Fremont  could  not  see  that  Colum 
bus  should  be  taken,  and  Polk  was  al 
lowed  to  fortify  there  and  to  send  some 
forces  against  a  Union  command  in  Mis 
souri.  On  November  5,  Grant  wrote  to 
C.  F.  Smith,  who  was  holding  the  mouth 
of  the  Cumberland,  "The  principal  point 
to  gain  is  to  prevent  the  enemy  from 
sending  a  force  in  the  rear  of  those  now 
out  of  his  command."  Accordingly,  two 
days  after  Grant  steamed  down  the  river 
in  the  morning  upon  Belmont  on  the 
west  bank,  and  retreated  up  the  river 
again  in  the  evening.  He  had  surprised 
and  destroyed  the  enemy's  camp  j  but 
Polk  crossed  with  re-enforcements  from 
Columbus,  and,  regaining  the  field,  drove 
him  from  it  with  a  loss  of  five  hundred 


54  ULYSSES   S.  GKANT 

men.  Grant  was  the  last  on  the  trans 
port,  riding  his  horse  aboard  on  a  plank 
pushed  out  for  him.  In  his  plain  dress, 
he  looked  like  a  private.  "  There's  a 
Yankee,  if  you  want  a  shot,"  said  Polk 
to  his  men  j  but  they,  busy  firing  at  the 
crowded  boats,  thought  one  shabby 
soldier  too  poor  a  mark.  Belinont  was  a 
defeat,  but  one  of  those  which  are  suc 
cesses,  just  as  there  are  victories  which 
are  failures.  It  accomplished  its  object. 
Polk  did  not  send  the  troops  into  Mis 
souri,  as  he  intended :  he  kept  them  at 
hand  against  further  surprises. 

Secession's  frontier  at  this  time  was 
a  slight  curve  from  Columbus  eastward 
and  up  to  Bowling  Green,  then  down  to 
Cumberland  Gap.  It  thus  lapped  over 
a  little  from  Tennessee  into  Kentucky. 
Its  weak  point  was  the  hole  made  in  it 
by  two  rivers,  the  Tennessee  and  Cum 
berland,  crossing  it  twelve  miles  apart. 
Two  forts  barred  these  precious  high 
ways —  Henry  and  Donelson.  If  these 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  55 

two  gates  were  knocked  down,  the 
Union  had  a  clear  road  to  the  heart  of 
the  South  j  for,  by  the  Tennessee,  troops 
could  travel  into  Alabama,  and  be  fed 
also.  Thus  Secession's  frontier  could  be 
pushed  back ;  and,  as  it  receded  down 
along  the  bank  of  the  Mississippi,  that 
highway  almost  inevitably  must  open. 
This  was  clear  to  many  eyes,  but  to 
McClellan's  it  was  not  visible.  This 
general-in- chief  could  see  nothing  be 
yond  his  own  movements.  At  St.  Louis, 
Fremont  had  been  succeeded  by  a  per 
son  equally  incapable.  General  Halleck 
was  the  sort  of  learned  soldier  who  brings 
learning  into  contempt.  He  was  full  of 
Jomini  and  empty  of  all  power  to  master 
a  situation.  On  him  Grant,  like  others, 
urged  the  value  of  striking  Forts  Henry 
and  Donelson.  But  Halleck,  whether 
under  McClellan's  influence  or  for  other 
reasons,  snubbed  him  j  and  so  for  a  while 
the  matter  rested.  At  length,  however, 
after  General  Thomas  near  Cumberland 


56  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 

Gap  had  knocked  the  east  end  of  Seces 
sion's  frontier  southward,  and  conse 
quently  threatened  its  middle  at  Bowling 
Green,  Halleck,  relinquishing  his  notion 
that  sixty  thousand  men  were  necessary, 
let  Grant  go  with  seventeen  thousand, 
and  seven  gunboats  under  Commodore 
Foote.  This  was  February  2.  In  four 
days,  Grant  had  Fort  Henry.  In  ten 
more,  Fort  Donelson  and  the  gates  to  the 
rivers  were  open.  Secession's  frontier 
was  crashed  through  from  Columbus  to 
Cumberland  Gap,  and  shrank  many  miles 
southward.  It  was  quick  and  final  j 
and  Grant  had  thought  of  it,  and  done 
it.  He  was  indebted  to  nobody.  His 
own  letter  about  it,  written  to  Wash- 
burne  a  month  later,  is  like  him  :  "I  see 
the  credit  of  attacking  the  enemy  by  the 
way  of  the  Tennessee  and  Cumberland  is 
variously  attributed.  It  is  little  to  talk 
about  it  being  the  great  wisdom  of  any 
general.  .  .  .  General  Halleck  no  doubt 
thought  of  this  route  long  ago,  and  I  am 
sure  I  did." 


ULYSSES   S.   GKANT  57 

Let  it  be  said  that  Grant's  adversaries 
helped  him  greatly.  In  dividing  his 
thirty  thousand  men  and  sending  but 
sixteen  thousand  to  Donelson,  Sidney 
Johnston  made  a  perilous  error.  In  giv 
ing  the  command  to  Floyd  and  Pillow, 
he  made  the  error  worse.  Grant  knew 
them.  He  struck,  and  won.  They  de 
serted,  leaving  Buckner  to  conduct  the 
surrender.  The  news  to  the  Union  was 
a  breath  of  health  after  jaded  months  of 
sickness.  Grant's  words,  "I  propose  to 
move  immediately  upon  your  works/7 
and  " unconditional  surrender,"  were 
like  a  backbone  appearing  in  something 
that  had  begun  to  look  like  a  jelly-fish. 
He  was  now  made  major-general  of  vol 
unteers. 

This  battle,  like  all  his  others,  has 
been  proved  a  mere  bungle  by  hostile 
critics.  The  spirit  of  these  gentlemen 
can  be  given  to  the  reader  in  a  word. 
One  of  them,  after  exposing  Grant's 
tactics,  exposes  his  English.  "I  pro- 


58  ULYSSES  S.  GRANT 

pose  to  move  immediately  upon  your 
works,"  would  be  grammar,  lie  says,  if 
'  *  immediately ' '  had  come  at  the  end. 

But  now  Grant  was  suddenly  relieved 
of  command,  and  put  in  arrest !  Hal- 
leek  had  not  heard  from  him  ;  and  Hal- 
leek  had  heard  of  his  leaving  his  post 
and  going  to  Nashville.  Grant's  ene 
mies,  the  contractors,  had  not  enjoyed 
his  recent  suggestion  to  Halleck  that 
"all  fraudulent  contractors  be  impressed 
into  the  ranks,  or,  still  better,  into  the 
gunboat  service,  where  they  could  have 
no  chance  of  deserting.'7  They  there 
fore  had  surrounded  Halleck  with 
rumours,  entirely  false,  of  Grant's  drink 
ing.  Halleck  had  had  a  spy  watching 
Grant's  habits  in  a  little  house  that  was 
his  headquarters  before  the  surrender. 
He  now,  never  waiting  to  learn  the  cause 
of  Grant's  silence  (which  was  due  to  in 
terrupted  communications)  or  Grant's 
reason  for  going  to  Nashville  (which  was 
to  confer  with  Buell,  who  had  occupied 


ULYSSES   S.   GEANT  59 

that  town),  petulantly  complained  to 
Washington.  It  was  set  right  in  nine 
days  5  but  Halleck  was  afraid  to  let 
Grant  know  the  hand  he  had  in  it. 
Grant  never  vouchsafed  a  syllable  to  the 
world's  injurious  assaults  upon  him  at 
this  hour  or  at  any  other  of  his  life. 
But  in  a  letter  to  Washbume  he  gives 
us  a  glimpse  into  his  silent  soul. 
"  There  are  some  things  which  I  wish 
to  say  to  you  in  my  own  vindication, 
not  that  I  care  a  straw  for  what  is  said 
individually,  but  because  you  have 
taken  so  much  interest  in  my  welfare. ?  ? 
And  one  evening  during  the  nine  days' 
humiliation,  a  sword  was  presented  to 
him  by  some  officers.  After  their  speech 
and  departure,  he  stood  looking  at  the 
gift  in  silence  where  it  lay  before  him  on 
the  table  of  the  gunboat  cabin.  Sud 
denly  pushing  it  from  him,  he  ex 
claimed,  "I  shall  never  wear  a  sword 
again ! f'  and  turned  away.  Only  one 
or  two  witnessed  this  breaking  of  the 


60  ULYSSES   S.  GKANT 

real  man  from  the  depths  of  his  grief. 
And  generally  he  managed  to  keep  a 
face  like  stone ;  but,  upon  the  occasion 
when  he  learned  of  his  friend  McPher- 
son's  death,  he  went  into  his  tent,  and 
wept  like  a  child. 

At  this  time  he  walked  in  intimate 
silence  with  C.  F.  Smith,  his  West  Point 
commandant,  and  his  temporary  supe 
rior  now  5  and  those  who  saw  them  say 
that  Gra-nt's  manner  to  Smith  was  some 
thing  of  an  old  pupil's  respect  and  some 
thing  of  a  plain  man's  admiration  for 
his  more  polished  and  splendid  friend, 
while  Smith,  on  his  side,  treated  Grant 
as  a  creature  whose  larger  dimensions  he 
felt  and  bowed  to.  Some  further  pict 
ures  of  Grant  at  Donelson  show  several 
sides  of  the  man.  On  the  eve  of  the 
surrender,  Pillow  had  made  a  desperate 
sortie  while  Grant  was  conferring  with 
Foote  on  his  gunboat.  For  a  while  it 
was  a  bad  business  ;  and  when  Grant  re 
turned,  he  flushed  at  the  havoc  made  in 


ULYSSES   S.  GKANT  61 

his  absence  :  his  reputation  was  at  stake. 
He  gathered  the  fragments,  and  before 
evening  knew  he  was  master  by  a 
shrewd  inference  which  has  become 
historic.  The  enemy's  haversacks  held 
three  days'  rations.  Others  saw  in  this 
a  preparation  for  a  three  days'  fight ; 
but  Grant  knew  it  meant,  not  fight,  but 
flight.  He  saw  that  next  morning  would 
give  him  Donelson.  He  wrote  to  Hal- 
leek,  i  i  They  will  surrender  to-morrow, > ' 
and,  when  asked  if  this  was  not  a  pre 
mature  message,  referred  to  the  haver 
sacks  as  the  basis  of  his  conviction. 
When  the  surrender  was  arranged, 
one  of  the  young  men  —  the  one  who 
had  spoken  of  Jomini  —  hoped  that  they 
would  have  the  picturesque  formalities 
of  such  occasions,  the  lowered  flags  and 
so  forth.  But  Grant  said,  emphatically, 
no.  ' l  Why  humiliate  a  brave  enemy  t ' ' 
he  inquired.  "We've  got  them.  That 
is  all  we  want."  When  the  crestfallen 
Buckner  capitulated,  and  Grant  found 


62  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 

him  penniless  in  the  forlorn  place,  he 
remembered  Buckner' s  friendly  help 
when  he  had  been  penniless  in  New 
York.  "  He  left  the  officers  of  his  own 
army"  (says  Buckner  in  a  speech  long 
afterward),  "and  followed  me,  with 
that  modest  manner  peculiar  to  himself, 
into  the  shadow,  and  there  tendered  me 
his  purse.  It  seems  to  me,  Mr.  Chair 
man,  that  in  the  modesty  of  his  nature 
he  was  afraid  the  light  would  witness 
that  act  of  generosity,  and  sought  to  hide 
it  from  the  world.  We  can  appreciate 
that,  sir."  Indeed,  we  can  j  and  we  can 
appreciate  Buckner' s  own  warm  heart 
whenever  history  gives  us  a  glimpse 
of  it.  When  Grant  was  bidding  this 
world  good-by  in  patience  and  suffering, 
Buckner  was  one  of  the  last  to  visit  him, 
and  take  his  hand. 

The  pen  would  linger  over  Donelson ; 
over  Smith's  gallantry  that  saved  the  day 
on  the  15th,  and  his  delightful  address  to 
the  Iowa  volunteers ;  over  McClernand's 


ULYSSES   S.   GBANT  63 

good  fighting,  and  over  Foote  and  his 
gunboats.  About  the  navy,  indeed,  a 
word  must  be  said.  From  Fort  Henry, 
which  it  took  unaided,  to  the  day  when 
Yicksburg  fell  and  the  great  river 
" rolled  unvexed  to  the  sea/7  the  navy 
was  not  only  illustrious  and  invaluable, 
but  also  it  made  fewer  mistakes  than  the 
army.  The  names  of  Foote,  Porter, 
Davis,  and  Farragut  (let  Ellett's  be 
added  too)  must  be  spoken  together 
with  those  of  the  land  soldiers.  As  some 
one  has  happily  said,  the  army  and  the 
navy  were  the  two  shears  of  the  scissors. 
From  Donelson,  Grant  stepped  into 
a  broadening  labyrinth  of  action.  He 
wished  at  once  to  strike  Polk  at  Colum 
bus.  Halleck  prescribed  caution ;  and 
Polk,  unhindered,  escaped  south  to 
Corinth,  where  under  Sidney  Johnston 
the  South  was  massing  all  the  strength 
it  could  bring.  Columbus  fell  to  the 
Union ;  and  New  Madrid  and  Island  No. 
10,  the  next  two  barriers  down  the 


64  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

river,  were  broken  by  Pope  and  Foote 
in  March  and  April.  On  land  it  grew 
plain  that  somewhere  about  Corinth  the 
armies  must  try  a  big  conclusion.  This 
happened  not  as  Grant  expected.  Ee- 
stored  to  command,  he  had  rejoined  the 
army  up  the  Tennessee  Eiver,  and  had 
approved — wisely,  according  to  many 
good  opinions — the  position  at  Pittsburg 
Landing  in  the  enemy's  country,  selected 
by  C.  F.  Smith.  But  he  looked  for  no 
battle  just  here.  And  here  Sidney 
Johnston  surprised  him.  On  Sunday 
and  Monday,  April  6  and  7,  was  fought 
the  battle  of  Shiloh,  Buell  arriving 
in  time  to  re-enforce  Grant  for  Monday's 
fight.  The  words  of  Buell  are  the 
words  of  an  imbittered  rival ;  but  they 
tell  the  unanswerable  truth. 

"An  army  comprising  seventy  regi 
ments  of  infantry,  twenty  battalions  of 
artillery,  and  a  sufficiency  of  cavalry,  lay 
for  two  weeks  and  more  in  isolated  camps, 
with  a  river  in  its  rear  and  a  hostile  army 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  65 

claimed  to  be  superior  in  numbers  twenty 
miles  distant  in  its  front,  while  the  com 
mander  made  his  headquarters  and 
passed  his  nights  nine  miles  away  on  the 
opposite  side  of  the  river.  It  had  no  line 
or  order  of  battle,  no  defensive  works  of 
any  sort,  no  outposts,  properly  speaking, 
to  give  warning  or  check  the  advance 
of  an  enemy,  and  no  recognised  head 
during  the  absence  of  the  regular  com 
mander.  On  a  Sunday  the  hostile  force 
arrived  and  formed  in  order  of  battle, 
without  detection  or  hindrance,  within 
a  mile  and  a  half  of  the  unguarded 
army,  advanced  upon  it  the  next  morn 
ing,  penetrated  its  disconnected  lines. 
.  .  .  Of  Grant  himself — is  nothing  to  be 
said?  ...  If  he  could  have  done  any 
thing  in  the  beginning,  he  was  not  on 
the  ground  in  time.  .  .  .  But  he  was  one 
of  the  many  there  who  would  have  re 
sisted  while  resistance  could  avail.  That 
is  all  that  can  be  said,  but  it  is  an  hon 
ourable  record. "  A.  severe  judgment, 


66  ULYSSES  S.  GKASTT 

which  controversy  sustains  and  history 
will  affirm.  Inexperience  is  the  honest 
explanation. 

Grant's  fame  is  not  helped  by  cover 
ing  Shiloh,  and  Grant's  fame  can  stand 
the  trnth.  So  also  did  Napoleon  lose 
touch  of  his  enemy  at  Marengo  through 
failure  to  use  his  cavalry  for  reconnoi 
tring.  He  went  to  sleep  expecting  no 
battle  in  the  morning  ;  and  in  the  morn 
ing  he  was  surprised  and  defeated  by 
Melas,  as  Johnston  surprised  and  de 
feated  Grant.  Ee-enforced  by  Desaix's 
return  in  the  afternoon,  he  recovered 
himself,  as  Grant,  re-enforced  by  Buell, 
recovered  himself  on  the  second  day. 
The  Union  lost  some  thirteen  thousand 
men,  the  South  eleven  thousand, — and 
understood  thereafter  that  all  American 
blood  was  equally  gallant,  whether 
Northern  or  Southern. 

Grant  made  another  mistake  here ; 
and  his  reasons  for  not  pursuing  the 
enemy  (who  had  lost  Sidney  Johnston 


ULYSSES  S.  GEAKT  67 

the  first  day)  are  not  convincing.  Mr. 
John  Fiske,  quoting  Sherman's  re 
mark  about  it  to  himself,  gives  the 
human  clew  to  this  bad  military  error : 
"I  assure  you,  my  dear  fellow,  we 
had  had  quite  enough  of  their  society 
for  two  whole  days,  and  were  only  too 
glad  to  get  rid  of  them  on  any  terms. " 
The  writer  has  heard  this  same  explana 
tion  from  another  soldier. 

So  the  enemy,  now  under  Beauregard, 
fell  back  to  Corinth,  and  with  needless 
and  pompous  caution  was  driven  from 
there  by  the  learned  Halleck  after  some 
weeks.  For  the  learned  Halleck  came 
down  now,  and  took  command  person 
ally  ;  and  Grant  was  again  under  a 
cloud,  a  mere  onlooker  with  the  sterile 
position  of  second  in  command.  Again, 
as  always,  he  answered  no  word  to  the 
furious  storm  of  abuse  which  the  coun 
try  let  loose  upon  him.  To  Washburne 
he  wrote:  "I  would  scorn  being  my 
own  defender .  .  .  except  through  the 


68  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 

record  ...  of  all  my  official  acts.  .  .  . 
To  say  that  I  have  not  been  distressed 
.  .  .  would  be  false.  .  .  .  One  thing  I  will 
assure  you  of,  however :  I  cannot  be 
driven  from  rendering  the  best  service 
within  my  ability  to  suppress  the  pres 
ent  rebellion. "  And  to  his  father  he 
wrote:  "You  must  not  expect  me  to 
write  in  my  own  defence,  nor  to  permit 
it  from  any  one  about  me.  I  know  that 
the  feeling  of  the  troops  under  my  com 
mand  is  favourable  to  me  ;  and,  so  long  as 
I  continue  to  do  my  duty  faithfully,  it 
will  remain  so.  I  require  no  defenders. 7  ? 
Nevertheless,  his  spirit  was  near  being 
broken.  He  had  nothing  given  him  to 
do.  He  was  in  a  sort  of  disgrace.  There 
seemed  no  outlook.  Halleck  had  re 
moved  his  willing  hand  from  the  plough. 
At  Corinth  he  had  applied  for  a  thirty 
days'  leave,  when  Sherman,  his  good 
friend,  suspected  that  all  was  not  well 
with  him.  "I  inquired  for  the  gen 
eral/  '  says  Sherman,  "and  was  shown 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  69 

to  his  tent,  where  I  found  him  seated  on 
a  camp-stool,  with  papers  on  a  rude 
camp -table.  ...  I  inquired  if  it  were 
true  that  he  was  going  away.  He  said, 
Yes.  I  then  inquired  the  reason ;  and 
he  said :  Sherman,  you  know.  You 
know  that  I  am  in  the  way  here.  I 
have  stood  it  as  long  as  I  can,  and  can 
endure  it  no  longer.  ...  I  then  begged 
him  to  stay,  illustrating  his  case  by  my 
own.  Before  the  battle  of  Shiloh,  I  had 
been  cast  down  by  a  mere  newspaper  as 
sertion.  .  .  .  He  .  .  .  promised  to  wait. 
.  .  .  Very  soon  after  this  ...  I  received 
a  note  from  him,  saying  that  he  ... 
would  remain.77  Thus  did  Sherman  at 
the  right  time  stretch  his  hand  to  Grant, 
and  help  him  rise  from  Shiloh,  and  go 
on  to  Vicksburg,  Chattanooga,  and  Ap- 
pomattox. 

As  Donelson,  so  now  Corinth  dpened 
more  gates  down  the  Mississippi  —  Fort 
Pillow  and  Memphis.  Before  the  first 
of  May,  Farragut  and  Porter  had  taken 


70  ULYSSES  S.  GKAOT 

New  Orleans.  Vicksburg  shotild  have 
followed  as  naturally  as  the  last  brick 
in  a  tumbling  row.  But  the  learned 
Halleck  was  there  to  save  it  with  his 
finical  and  disastrous  meddling.  He  had 
a  hundred  thousand  men  reporting  for 
duty  :  Beauregard  had  half  that  number. 
He  had  also  the  moral  impetus  of  vic 
tory,  while  the  South  was  shaken  and 
disconcerted  by  Shiloh  and  Sidney  John 
ston' s  death.  The  very  brilliant  ex 
ploits  of  Mitchell  had  opened  the  way  to 
Chattanooga  for  him.  Mobile  and  Vicks- 
burg  were  but  feebly  protected.  Other 
men  had  gathered  these  opportunities, 
which  now  slid  away  like  sand  through 
his  inanely  opened  fingers.  He  sat  cau 
tiously  down  5  sent  Buell  to  repair  a 
railroad,  which  was  promptly  torn  up  j 
sent  away  troops  to  hold  unprofitable 
points  5  refused  troops  to  Farragut,  who 
wished  to  strike  Port  Hudson  and  Vicks- 
burg ;  forbade  Pope  to  risk  a  battle  on 
any  consideration  5  and  crowned  his 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  71 

whole  crass  performance  with  the  words  : 
"I  think  the  enemy  will  continue  his 
retreat,  which  is  all  I  desire. "  The 
enemy  immediately  strengthened  Port 
Hudson,  Vicksburg,  and  Chattanooga  ; 
and  Halleck  was  made  general-in-chief 
at  Washington  !  To  the  blunders  of  this 
time  may  be  added  the  vast  farce  of  the 
legal  tender  act,  when  the  government, 
against  the  soundest  advice  and  warning, 
declined  to  borrow  money  at  market 
prices,  because  this  would  be  a  undigni 
fied,^  and  issued  instead  pieces  of 
paper,  which  it  told  the  world  were 
worth  a  dollar,  and  presently  enjoyed 
the  dignity  of  having  the  world  value 
at  thirty-five  cents.  There  are  blunders 
in  1862  so  stultifying  as  to  seem  incredi 
ble,  had  we  not  seen  much  the  same 
sort  of  thing  since.  But  we  were  fight 
ing  Americans,  not  Spaniards,  then. 
Happily,  Jefferson  Davis  made  some 
blunders,  too ;  and  thus  Grant  had 
only  Pemberton,  and  not  Van  Dora, 


72  ULYSSES  S.  GKAOT 

to  fight  at  Vicksburg,   when  the  time 

came. 

Upon  Halleck's  promotion,  Grant 
was  put  in  command  of  the  armies  of 
the  Mississippi  and  the  Tennessee.  The 
battles  of  luka  and  Corinth  were  fought. 
By  November  Grant  was  once  again  able 
to  go  on  with  his  interrupted  strategy 
of  flanking  the  Mississippi.  It  was  not 
until  the  following  spring  that  he  walked 
to  his  goal  with  a  firm  step.  In  the 
months  between  he  was  not  only  ham 
pered  by  many  external  embarrassments, 
but  his  own  mind  had  not  come  to  a 
final  clear  determination.  The  jealousy 
of  McClernand,  the  treachery  that  lost 
him  his  base  at  Holly  Springs,  and  his 
own  not  very  sound  plan  of  co-operating 
with  Sherman  on  the  east  bank  —  these 
among  other  causes  helped  his  first 
failure.  Then  in  the  winter  months  his 
canal-cutting,  and  various  operations 
upon  both  sides  of  the  river,  were  de 
feated  by  Nature  herself.  Perhaps  he 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  73 

should  have  known  that  land  and  water 
were  tangled  in  such  a  chaos  here  that 
the  first  chapter  of  Genesis  alone  could 
have  straightened  them  for  an  army. 
One  sentence  from  Porter7  s  report  of 
the  Yazoo  Pass  attempt,  and  what  the 
gunboats  had  to  do  in  the  narrow  chan 
nels  that  enmeshed  them  with  vegeta 
tion,  draws  the  whole  picture  of  this 
winter  without  need  of  further  com 
ment  :  "I  never  yet  saw  vessels  so  well 
adapted  to  knocking  down  trees,  hauling 
them  up  by  the  roots,  or  demolishing 
bridges."  Yet,  perhaps,  Grant  knew 
all  this  very  well.  His  troops  were  in  a 
wretched  watery  camp  opposite  Vicks- 
burg.  Disease  had  heavily  visited  them. 
The  graves  of  their  late  comrades  were 
forever  in  their  sight  on  the  narrow 
levee.  Moreover,  the  country  clam 
oured  for  results ;  and  enemies,  both 
military  and  civil,  were  pressing  Lin 
coln  for  Grant's  removal.  It  is  re 
corded  that  General  Thomas  arrived  at 


74  ULYSSES  S.  GKAtfT 

Porter's  headquarters  with  an  order  to 
relieve  Grant,  if  it  were  necessary. 
Porter  told  Thomas  that  he  would  be 
tarred  and  feathered  if  his  mission  be 
came  known. 

Perhaps  Grant  dug  his  canals  and  cut 
his  trees  to  give  his  soldiers  less  time  to 
think  of  their  hardships,  and  to  make 
an  appearance  of  activity  until  the  high 
water  should  subside  and  permit  real 
activity.  His  mind  was  digging,  too, 
deep  into  the  national  situation.  In 
silence  and  independence  it  reached  its 
own  convictions,  and  then,  attentively 
listening  to  contrary  opinions,  disre 
garded  these  and  pursued  its  way.  And 
in  everything  that  Grant  did,  the  admi 
rable  navy  supported  him  brilliantly. 
On  April  16  it  ran  the  Yicksburg  bat 
teries  in  an  hour  and  forty  minutes.  In 
six  days  the  transports  followed ;  and 
Vicksburg  beheld  the  army  that  had 
been  sitting  in  the  mud  for  so  many 
weeks  depart,  to  return  presently  on  its 
own  side  the  river  with  a  vengeance. 


ULYSSES   S.   GBANT  75 

Grant's  aria  was  at  length  raised  to 
strike.  His  first  blow  glanced  at  Grand 
Gulf,  the  southernmost  defence  of  Vicks- 
burg  ;  but  the  next  day  he  stood  on  the 
east  shore,  the  tall,  defended,  baffling 
shore  which  Secession  had  called  its 
Gibraltar.  To  do  this,  he  had  had  to 
come  down  the  river  to  cross  at  Bruins- 
burg,  some  thirty- one  miles  below  Vicks- 
burg.  "When  this  was  effected,  I  felt 
a  degree  of  relief  scarcely  ever  equalled 
since/'  he  says.  "  I  was  on  dry  ground 
on  the  same  side  of  the  river  with  the 
enemy." 

He  now  manoeuvred  to  deceive  Pem- 
berton,  and  easily  did  so.  On  May  1 
he  won  the  battle  of  Port  Gibson.  He 
next  made  his  great  decision  to  cut  loose 
from  his  base  of  supplies,  and  not  inform 
Halleck  until  it  was  too  late  to  stop  him. 
When  Sherman  with  several  others 
strongly  protested  against  this  cutting 
loose  from  the  base  of  supplies  —  the 
triumphant  flash  of  daring  and  right 


76  ULYSSES   S.  GEAKT 

judgment  which  is  Grant's  highest  claim 
to  purely  military  greatness  —  the  gen 
eral  listened,  but  went  on  with  his  plan. 
And  now,  indeed,  he  raised  his  arm,  and 
struck.  On  May  17  he  had  Pemberton 
penned  in  Vicksburg,  and  a  telegram 
from  Halleck  ordering  him  to  wait  for 
General  Banks !  In  six  days  he  had 
won  four  battles,  prevented  Johnston's 
joining  Pemberton,  and  was  now  sur 
rounding  Yicksburg  itself.  After  the 
bloody  frontal  attack  of  the  22d  (some 
thing  he  owned  in  later  life  to  have 
been  a  mistake),  he  settled  to  a  siege. 
We  must  remember  that  Pemberton  had 
made  many  things  easy  for  him ;  Pem 
berton  was  deceived  by  his  preliminary 
manoeuvres.  Pemberton  set  about  cut 
ting  him  from  his  base  a  week  after  he 
had  no  base.  Pemberton  divided  his 
own  strength  instead  of  falling  on  him 
with  the  whole  of  it,  when  his  was  scat 
tered.  Pemberton  ignored  all  of  John 
ston's  better  recommendations,  ending 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  77 

by  refusing  the  advice  to  let  Vicksburg 
go,  and  escape  with  his  army  at  least. 
All  these  follies  had  been  committed  by 
Pemberton  j  but  we  must  also  remember 
that  Grant  knew  Pemberton  was  the 
man  to  commit  them,  and  fought  his 
campaign  accordingly.  And  so  on  July 
4,  1863,  Yicksburg  surrendered.  Pem 
berton  remained  seated  with  his  staff  as 
Grant  came  up  on  their  veranda.  None 
of  them  seem  to  have  been  of  the  mettle 
that  loses  gracefully;  but  in  the  words 
of  a  gentleman,  the  Comte  de  Paris, 
"  As  victory  put  Grant  in  a  position  to 
be  indifferent  to  this,  he  affected  not  to 
notice  it,  and,  addressing  Pemberton, 
asked  him  how  many  rations  were 
needed  for  his  army.77  Consideration 
for  people  in  distress  was,  after  the 
fact  of  surrender,  his  first  thought  here, 
as  it  had  been  at  Donelson.  And  with 
the  same  humane  watchfulness,  when  he 
presently  discovered  a  Mississippi  steam 
boat  captain  overcharging  his  men  and 


78  ULYSSES   S.  GBANT 

officers  going  home  on  furlough,  he  com 
pelled  the  excess  to  be  refunded.  "I 
will  teach  them/7  he  said,  "that  the 
men  who  have  perilled  their  lives  to 
open  the  Mississippi  Eiver  for  their 
benefit  cannot  be  imposed  upon  with 
impunity." 

So  Pemberton  surrendered  Vicksburg 
to  Grant  in  a  sulky  temper,  and  pro 
ceeded  to  write  articles  proving  Johnston 
was  to  blame.  On  the  day  before,  the 
noble  and  defeated  Lee  was  saying  to 
a  Confederate  brother,  "Never  mind, 
general,  all  this  has  been  my  fault :  it  is 
I  that  have  lost  this  fight,  and  you  must 
help  me  out  of  it  the  best  way  you  can." 
For  on  the  preceding  day,  July  3,  1863, 
the  Union  had  won  Gettysburg.  On 
this  day  of  Vicksburg' s  surrender,  Lee 
began  his  retreat.  Had  two  separate 
nations  [been  at  war,  here  they  would 
have  stopped.  But  one  piece  of  a  na 
tion  was  trying  to  separate  itself  from 
the  rest ;  and  the  rest  had  to  follow  it, 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  79 

and  wholly  crush  it.  This  necessity  was 
clearly  seen  then  by  no  one  so  much  as 
by  General  Grant.  Off  in  the  West 
by  himself,  his  clear,  strong  mind  had 
grasped  it ;  and  every  blow  he  struck 
was  to  this  end,  and  every  counsel  that 
he  gave.  The  North  began  to  feel  this 
huge  force  resting  for  the  moment  on  the 
banks  of  the  now  open  Mississippi.  It 
looked  away  from  Virginia,  scraped  raw 
with  the  vain  pendulum  of  advance  and 
retreat,  to  Donelson,  Shiloh,  Corinth, 
Vicksburg.  Here  it  saw  no  pendulum, 
but  an  advance  as  sure,  if  as  slow,  as 
fate.  Therefore,  Grant's  name  began  to 
be  spoken  with  a  different  sound.  And 
a  Southern  newspaper  perceived  in  him 
the  largest  threat  to  Confederate  armies. 
It  called  him  "the  bee  which  has  really 
stung  our  flanks  so  long." 

After  Donelson,  Grant  had  written 
Sherman:  "I  feel  under  many  obliga 
tions  to  you  for  the  kind  terms  of  your 
letter,  and  hope  that,  should  an  oppor- 


80  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

tunity  occur,  you  will  earn  for  yourself 
that  promotion  which  you  are  kind 
enough  to  say  belongs  to  me.  I  care 
nothing  for  promotion,  so  long  as  our 
armies  are  successful,  and  no  political 
appointments  are  made."  He  did  not 
now  relish  the  suggestion  of  his  being 
ordered  to  the  Potomac,  which  first  came 
to  him  at  this  time.  He  wrote:  "My 
going  could  do  no  possible  good.  They 
have  there  able  officers  who  have  been 
brought  up  with  that  army." 

Meanwhile  Vicksburg  had  made  him 
a  major-general  in  the  regular  army. 
Lincoln  had  written  him  his  hearty  per 
sonal  thanks,  and  the  cause  of  the  Union 
had  brightened  at  home  and  abroad. 
The  London  Times  and  Saturday  Eeview 
had  lately  been  quoting  the  Bible  as 
sanction  for  slavery  ;  for  England  dearly 
loves  the  Bible ;  but  now  many  voices 
in  London  became  sure  that  slavery  was 
wicked;  for  England  dearly  loves  suc 
cess. 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  81 

Grant  was  more  pestered  than  ever 
now  with  Jews  and  other  traders.  As 
he  wrote  Chase  on  July  21 :  "  Any  trade 
whatsoever  with  the  rebellious  states  is 
weakening  to  us.  ...  It  will  be  made 
the  means  of  supplying  the  enemy  with 
what  they  want."  His  sound  sense, 
however,  could  not  wholly  prevail 
against  the  politicians.  One  would 
gladly  dwell  upon  the  story  of  the  cotton, 
historically  important,  and  romantic  in 
detail:  how  —  for  one  example  —  a  de 
termined  and  beautiful  lady  with  her 
French  maid  spent  some  six  weeks  on 
board  a  certain  flag-ship,  and  came 
triumphant  away,  bringing  all  the  cotton 
she  wanted  and  leaving  all  the  reputa 
tion  she  had ;  but  we  must  go  on  to 
Chattanooga. 

Again,  as  in  the  preceding  year, 
Grant  felt  that  one  aggressive  blow 
struck  should  be  followed  up  by  an 
other;  and  Halleck  again  rejected  the 
notion.  Once  more  the  gathered  army 


82  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

was  dispersed  on  various  errands  of  sec 
ondary  importance,  and  once  more  the 
railroad  of  last  year  was  solemnly  ordered 
to  be  repaired,  this  time  by  Sherman. 
In  September  a  fall  from  his  horse  in 
New  Orleans  confined  Grant  to  his  bed 
for  twenty-one  days.  While  he  was  still 
in  bed,  General  Eosecrans,  after  prelim 
inary  success  in  Tennessee,  got  himself 
into  the  gravest  difficulties  at  the  bat 
tle  of  Chickamauga,  where,  but  for  the 
splendid  fight  that  Thomas  made  the 
second  day,  he  would  certainly  have 
been  destroyed  by  General  Bragg.  As 
it  was,  the  Union  forces  escaped,  and  re 
tired  into  Chattanooga.  The  army  could 
no  longer  attack.  Very  soon  it  could  no 
longer  retreat.  Order  was  nowhere, 
and  starvation  was  approaching.  Jeffer 
son  Davis  visited  Bragg  during  this  time, 
and,  looking  down  from  a  rock  upon  the 
beleaguered,  helpless  army,  felt  much 
natural  joy.  Like  Donelson,  like  Vicks- 
burg,  like  Corinth,  Chattanooga  also  was 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  83 

a  vital  strategic  point,  a  mountain  fun 
nel  —  the  only  one  —  through  which  the 
South-west  could  send  supplies  to  Lee. 

One  coherent  plan  for  relieving  the 
starvation  General  Eosecrans  evidently 
had  ;  and,  to  carry  it  out,  he  was  going 
to  employ  Hooker's  command,  at  this 
time  sent  to  re-enforce  him.  It  involved 
bridging  the  Tennessee  Eiver,  thereby 
to  acquire  the  use  of  an  approach  not 
commanded  by  the  enemy.  To  state 
what  geographical  precision  this  plan 
had  reached  in  the  mind  of  General 
Eosecrans  involves  a  question  of  accu 
racy  between  his  memory  and  the  mem 
ory  of  General  W.  F.  Smith.  Both  with 
some  acrimony  have  claimed  the  glory 
of  thinking  of  it,  and  upon  this  point 
the  official  records  are  not  quite  specific  ; 
but  the  glory  of  doing  it,  and  doing 
it  to  perfection,  is  certainly  General 
Smith's.  Enough  has  been  said  to  re 
mind  the  reader  that  we  are  walking 
here,  as  everywhere,  upon  the  treacher 
ous  embers  of  controversy. 


84  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

Twice  in  September,  Grant,  still  in 
bed,  had  sent  Bosecrans  assistance.  On 
October  10  he  received  a  summons  to 
Cairo,  and  hobbled  off  on  the  same  day. 
From  Cairo  on  the  17th  he  was  ordered 
to  Louisville,  and  on  the  way  met  the 
Secretary  of  War,  who  placed  him  in 
command  of  the  newly  created  Military 
Division  of  the  Mississippi.  Matters 
were  desperate  at  Chattanooga.  Bains 
had  melted  the  country  to  mire,  and  ten 
thousand  horses  and  mules  were  dead  of 
hunger.  October  19,  Bosecrans  started 
with  Smith  down  the  river  to  view  the 
best  place  for  the  intended  bridge  to 
open  a  better  avenue  of  supplies.  Bose 
crans  stopped  at  the  hospital.  When 
Smith  reported  from  his  inspection  of 
the  shore  down  the  river,  he  found  the 
general  relieved  by  Grant,  and  Thomas 
in  his  place.  Next  day  Grant,  still  very 
lame,  began  his  journey  from  Louisville 
to  Chattanooga.  By  train,  on  horseback 
through  the  washed-out  mountains,  and 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  85 

carried  in  dangerous  places  because  of 
his  injury,  lie  reached  Chattanooga  the 
night  of  the  23d,  "wet,  dirty,  and  well/' 
as  Dana's  literary  pen  wrote  Stanton. 
And  forthwith  order  began  to  shape  it 
self  from  formlessness.  Grant's  enemies 
say  he  had  nothing  to  do  with  it,  that  it 
would  have  come  without  him.  To  this 
there  is  a  sufficient  answer  :  it  did  come 
with  him.  Guessing  what  might  have 
been  helps  history  no  better  than  the 
post  mortem  cures  the  patient.  And,  in 
truth,  these  critics  are  preposterous. 
Earth  has  not  anything  more  childish 
than  a  military  man  airing  a  grievance. 
That  night  Grant  listened,  and  asked 
questions  of  the  officers.  These  felt  that 
somebody  had  come  among  them.  He 
was  delighted  with  the  scheme  for  the 
new  avenue  of  supplies  which  General 
Smith  explained  to  him,  and  his  mind 
was  also  filled  with  plans  for  aggression. 
After  all  these  days  of  passive  defence, 
he  must  have  seemed  to  Thomas  and  the 


86  ULYSSES   S.  GKANT 

rest  of  that  company  like  the  flood-tide 
after  the  ebb.  Next  day  he  went  to  see 
where  Smith  was  going  to  open  the  road. 
That  night  he  wrote  leaf  after  leaf 
of  despatches,  brief,  forcible,  unambig 
uous,  and  with  scarcely  a  change  of  a 
word  or  a  pause  to  choose  one ;  for  such 
was  his  great  power  in  this  matter  of 
writing  what  he  had  to  say.  He  ordered 
up  Sherman  from  Corinth  where  Hal- 
leek's  railroad-building  was  delaying 
that  general.  He  sent  reassuring  mes 
sages  to  Halleck  about  Burnside,  who 
was  threatened  in  East  Tennessee.  As 
we  think  of  him  during  these  days,  reel 
ing  off  orders  and  pulling  the  scattered 
shreds  of  mismanagement  together,  he 
seems  like  a  quietly  spinning  dynamo 
which,  silent  and  unnoticed,  in  a  small 
house,  supplies  the  current  that  drives  a 
great  system  of  moving  wheels.  At  mid 
night  on  the  27th  General  Smith  began, 
and  at  ten  next  morning  brilliantly 
finished,  his  opening  of  the  new  road. 


ULYSSES  S.  GKAtfT  87 

It  was  the  first  stroke  of  salvation  for 
Chattanooga.  That  night  the  enemy 
under  Longstreet  fought  Hooker  on 
Lookout  Mountain  to  retrieve  this  loss, 
but  failed.  The  dynamo  continued 
steadily  spinning  destruction  for  Bragg, 
who  now  did  a  foolish  thing.  He  sent 
twenty  thousand  men  away  under  Long- 
street  to  attack  Burnside.  At  this, 
Grant  nearly  did  a  foolish  thing  himself. 
He  ordered  an  assault.  But  Thomas 
saved  him  from  this  error.  All  the 
while  Sherman  with  his  army  was  com 
ing  nearer.  Swollen  waters  and  deep 
walking  clogged  their  struggling  march, 
and  the  battle  was  put  off  for  them.  At 
length  Bragg  from  his  heights  saw  them 
prowling  in  the  heavy  country  across 
the  river,  thorght  they  were  going  to 
help  Burnside,  and  forthwith  despatched 
more  help  to  Longstreet. 

And  now  the  reader  must  see  the  shape 
of  the  country.  Let  him  think  of  a 
theatre,  and  stand  on  the  stage,  and  look 


88  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 

at  the  house.  On  the  stage  he  is  in 
Chattanooga,  with  the  river  and  moun 
tains  behind  him,  and  Sherman  creeping 
behind  them.  In  the  house  sits  Bragg 
all  around  the  balcony.  A  valley  cuts 
the  balcony  in  the  middle,  but  Bragg 
from  both  sides  commands  it  as  if  the 
horseshoe  were  not  split.  At  the  right 
end  of  the  balcony  is  Lookout  Mountain, 
like  a  stage  box.  The  box  opposite  is 
the  north  end  of  Missionary  Eidge  ;  and 
the  whole  left  side  of  the  balcony  is  part 
of  the  same  ridge.  Bragg  holds  them 
all.  His  centre  is  up  on  the  left  side  of 
the  balcony  :  his  two  wings  are  the  two 
stage  boxes  that  look  at  each  other  across 
the  valley.  He  also  holds  a  position  in 
the  middle  of  the  parquet,  called  Or 
chard  Knob.  The  par-uet  is  Chatta 
nooga  valley.  To  attack  Bragg,  there 
is  a  choice.  Go  at  the  centre,  cut  him 
in  two,  and  beat  the  stage  boxes  sepa 
rately,  or  get  round  behind  the  boxes, 
and  attack  both,  so  that  one  cannot  go 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  89 

to  help  the  other.  But  the  centre  was  a 
straight  climb  up  into  the  face  of  the 
enemy,  and  Grant  determined  upon  the 
boxes.  The  left-hand  box,  the  north 
end  of  Missionary  Eidge,  was  to  be  the 
main  affair ;  and  Sherman  was  to  con 
duct  it.  He  was  to  creep  round  and 
there  turn  Bragg' s  flank,  while  Hooker 
was  to  turn  the  other  flank  on  Lookout 
Mountain.  Thus  Sherman  might  cut 
Bragg  from  his  base,  which  lay  less  than 
a  mile  behind  that  part  of  Missionary 
Eidge.  Bragg  never  suspected  this  could 
happen.  Sherman  had  crept  out  of 
sight,  gone  to  Burnside,  he  supposed  ; 
and  the  Union  troops  seemed  to  him 
from  his  balcony  to  be  thinking  of  his 
centre  and  of  Lookout  Mountain  oppo 
site.  So  he  did  not  much  fortify  the 
precious  north  end  of  Missionary  Eidge. 
He  was  doing  precisely  what  Grant 
manoeuvred  for.  But  Chattanooga  is 
one  of  the  great  battles  that  melt  to  a 
new  shape  in  the  very  hands  of  their 
sculptors. 


90  ULYSSES  S.  GBAET 

On  Friday,  November  20,  a  day  of 
heavy  falling  rain,  Bragg  sent  word  to 
Grant,  "As  there  may  still  be  some  non- 
combatants  in  Chattanooga,  I  deem  it 
proper  to  notify  you  that  prudence  would 
dictate  their  early  withdrawal.'7  "I 
did  not  know  what  the  intended  decep 
tion  was,"  says  Grant.  Meanwhile  no 
battle  could  begin  until  Sherman  had 
wholly  crept  round  behind  that  left- 
hand  box  —  a  direful  work  in  the  mud, 
with  a  bridge  thirteen  hundred  and  fifty 
feet  long  to  build,  and  build  noiselessly. 
On  Sunday  a  deserter  reported  that 
Bragg  was  falling  back.  Perhaps  he 
was  going  against  Burnside  himself.  If 
so,  he  should  not  get  away  without  some 
little  trouble  at  least.  Therefore  on 
Monday  the  little  trouble  occurred.  Up 
in  his  balcony,  Bragg  saw  going  on  down 
in  the  parquet  what  he  supposed  to  be  a 
dress  parade  of  the  Union  troops.  Sud 
denly  they  rushed  :  the  parade  blossomed 
into  a  sharp  encounter,  and  before  the 


ULYSSES   S.   GEANT  91 

Southern  troops  well  knew  what  it 
meant  they  had  lost  Orchard  Knob. 
So  the  Union  was  a  mile  nearer  to  the 
rising  land  at  the  foot  of  Missionary 
Eidge.  Bragg  showed  his  strength  on 
top,  and  then  Grant  knew  that  he  was 
not  retreating.  Orchard  Knob  was  now 
strengthened  with  artillery.  Bragg  was 
frightened,  and  took  troops  away  from 
Lookout  Mountain  across  to  the  other 
side,  where  the  unseen  Sherman  was 
approaching.  Through  that  night  Sher 
man  came  out  from  the  concealing  hills 
upon  the  river,  dropped  silently  down 
the  rivor  on  the  bridge-boats,  caught  all 
the  rebel  river  pickets  but  one,  and  by 
dawn  began  his  noiseless  bridge  of  thir 
teen  hundred  feet,  which  General  Smith 
finished  by  noon.  By  one,  he  was 
marching  to  the  foot  of  the  ridge  in  a 
drizzling  rain,  hidden  by  clouds  from 
the  enemy's  watch  across  the  theatre  on 
Lookout  Mountain.  By  this  Tuesday 
night  he  was  upon  his  end  of  Missionary 


92  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 

Kidge,  and  for  the  first  time  saw  a  gap 
splitting  him  from  the  rest  of  the  ridge. 
That  retarding  gap  greatly  changed  the 
battle's  intended  shape.  So  much  for 
Sherman  on  Tuesday,  on  the  left. 

On  the  right,  Hooker  was  unex 
pectedly  strengthened  by  a  part  of  Sher 
man's  force  which  the  breaking  of  a 
bridge  had  prevented  from  following 
Sherman.  Therefore,  Grant  turned 
Lookout  Mountain  into  a  more  serious 
matter  than  he  had  planned.  At  the 
mountain's  front,  Hooker  displayed  him 
self;  and,  while  he  thus  occupied  the 
enemy's  attention  on  top,  from  behind 
them  a  part  of  his  force  came  somewhat 
upon  their  rear  through  the  drifting  fog. 
Their  picket  was  taken.  From  his  post 
of  observation  on  Orchard  Knob,  Grant 
saw  the  enemy  coming  down  the  moun 
tain  to  oppose  the  advance  there.  But, 
further  round,  the  other  force  that  had 
taken  the  picket  was  pressing  on  and  up; 
and  suddenly  the  Confederates  saw  this 


ULYSSES  S.   GKANT  93 

meeting  invasion.  They  fired  down  use 
lessly.  Though  men  fell  in  this  steep 
scramble,  the  force  came  on  through 
stones  and  thickets,  and,  joining  with 
the  force  in  front,  ascended  out  of  sight 
into  the  mist,  until  Grant  could  often 
only  hear  the  noise  of  the  invisible  guns 
nearer  and  nearer  the  top  of  the  moun 
tain.  By  night  Hooker  was  established 
there. 

The  Wednesday  morning  was  cold 
and  fine.  The  battle's  change  of  shape 
from  its  original  design  was  clear  to  see. 
Over  on  Sherman's  side  many  troops 
were  now  massed  against  him.  Nor  on 
account  of  that  unexpected  gap  between 
the  end  of  the  ridge  and  its  continuation 
could  he  achieve  his  assault  with  the 
necessary  celerity.  Bragg  had  taken  his 
troops  from  Lookout  Mountain  to  oppose 
Sherman  ;  and  Bragg,  should  he  see  fit, 
might  really  get  away  without  further 
harm  to  himself.  So  Hooker  was  or 
dered  across  from  Lookout  Mountain  to 


94  ULYSSES  S.   GBASTT 

interrupt  his  possible  retreat.  As  Sher 
man  came  fighting  along  Missionary 
Eidge  from  the  left,  Bragg  removed 
more  and  more  troops  from  the  centre  of 
the  balcony  to  oppose  him,  so  that  up 
there  the  enemy's  force  was  visibly  grow 
ing  thinner  in  the  centre  as  it  grew 
thicker  on  the  left.  The  shape  of 
the  battle  was  steadily  changing. 
Something  must  be  done  to  divert  the 
enemy's  increasing  blows  from  Sherman. 
Hooker,  coming  behind  them  from 
Lookout  Mountain,  could  do  it ;  but  no 
Hooker  was  to  be  seen.  His  speed  had 
been  checked  by  a  destroyed  bridge. 
He  was  on  his  way,  but  not  at  hand  for 
this  urgent  hour.  As  we  easily  follow 
a  boat  race  or  a  game  on  land  from  our 
arranged  benches,  so  Grant  and  his  staff 
from  Orchard  Knob  saw,  as  it  has  only 
once  or  twice  been  seen  before,  the  whole 
thunderous  pageant,  flashing  upon  the 
hills  of  Chattanooga.  And  up  there, 
inaccessible  to  help,  Sherman  was  fight- 


ULYSSES   S.   GBANT  95 

ing  the  current  of  a  gathering  tide. 
Bragg' s  attention  must  be  distracted 
from  him  down  here,  somehow.  And 
so  this  battle  takes  its  final  unexpected 
splendid  shape,  and  passes  like  a  great 
song  into  our  history.  Four  of  our 
greatest  —  Thomas,  Sherman,  Sheridan, 
Grant  —  stand  together  in  it,  the  only 
time  they  ever  did  so, — a  gathering  of 
chiefs,  indeed ;  and  with  them  in  their 
splendour,  as  is  fit,  inspired  by  them  to 
share  their  own  renown,  stands  the 
American  volunteer,  reckless  at  the 
right  time,  suddenly  immortal  with  wild 
courageous  wisdom.  He  is  told,  by  way 
of  experiment,  to  advance  to  the  base  of 
the  hill — that  centre  which  Bragg  had 
been  thinning —  and  there  take  Bragg' s 
lowest  line  of  works.  Again  he  goes 
steadily,  as  if  on  parade,  with  flags 
flying  and  music  playing.  Then  he 
swiftly  charges,  and  next  finds  himself 
master  of  the  rifle-pits,  with  prisoners 
captured  he  has  not  time  to  know  how. 


96  ULYSSES   S.  GEANT 

Here  he  has  been  ordered  to  stop.  But 
down  on  his  head  from  the  top  pours 
such  a  stream  of  fire  that  staying  is 
death,  while  going  back  is  failure. 
Twenty  thousand  of  him  crouch  there, — 
twenty  thousand  bodies,  but  one  white- 
hot  spirit,  transfigured  and  resistless. 
Without  orders,  he  rises,  he  climbs,  he 
goes  on  his  hands,  he  mounts  the  broken 
steep  slant  of  hill,  leading  his  captains 
as  much  as  they  lead  him;  and  the 
astonished  Grant  from  Orchard  Knob 
sees  him  storm  the  crest  and  turn  the 
enemy's  guns  upon  themselves.  It  is 
done.  Bragg  is  split  in  flying  pieces. 
The  stars  and  stripes  wave  upon  Mis 
sionary  Eidge. 

When  Grant  rode  up  among  this 
seething  triumph,  the  men  quickly  found 
him  out,  and  swarmed  upon  him  by 
hundreds,  embracing  his  feet  and  calling 
his  name.  And,  among  all  the  gifts  and 
tokens  that  presently  showered  upon 
him  for  this  great  November  25,  even 


ULYSSES   S.  GKANT  97 

brighter  than  the  gold  medal  voted  by 
Congress  is  the  memory  of  that  brier- 
wood  cigar-case  given  him  by  a  poor 
soldier  who  made  it  with  his  pocket- 
knife. 

Now  he  sat  in  the  centre  of  his  nation's 
bright  day.  Donelson,  Vicksburg,  Chat 
tanooga,  melted  together  in  his  fame. 
Thanksgiving  spread  from  his  deed  in 
widening  circles.  His  message  to  the 
government,  the  pith  of  modesty,  "I 
believe  I  am  not  premature  in  announc 
ing  a  complete  victory  over  Bragg/7  is 
enough  and  better  than  if  it  had  been 
more.  And  Lincoln  answered,  "God 
bless  you  all! "  And  what  did  Sherman 
with  his  men  do  now?  Having  "with 
out  a  moment's  rest  after  a  march  of  over 
four  hundred  miles,  without  sleep  for 
three  successive  nights,"  crossed  the 
Tennessee  and  fought  their  share  of 
Chattanooga  and  pursued  the  enemy  out 
of  Tennessee,  they  "turned  more  than  a 
hundred  and  twenty  miles  north,  and 


98  ULYSSES   S.  GKANT 

compelled  Longstreet  to  raise  the  siege 
of  Knoxville"  where  Burnside  was. 
When  in  a  few  months  Grant  was  ap 
pointed  full  lieutenant  general,  under 
special  act  of  Congress  (he  was  the  first 
since  Washington,  Winfield  Scott  being 
only  brevet),  he  wrote  to  Sherman : 
"  What  I  want  is  to  express  my  thanks 
to  you  and  McPherson  as  the  men  to 
whom  above  all  others  I  feel  indebted 
for  whatever  I  have  had  of  success. 
How  far  your  execution  of  whatever  has 
been  given  you  to  do  entitles  you  to  the 
reward  I  am  receiving,  you  cannot 
know  as  well  as  I  do."  And  Sherman 
answered  in  a  spirit  equally  noble, 
"You  do  yourself  injustice  and  us  too 
much  honour."  In  these  letters  the  two 
men  lay  bare  their  best  selves.  And 
how  well  Sherman  knew  his  friend ! 
"Now  as  to  the  future,"  he  says,  "do 
not  stay  in  Washington.  Halleck  is 
better  qualified  than  you  to  stand  the 
buffets  of  intrigue  and  policy.  For 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  £9 

God's    sake  and  your    country's  sake, 
come  out  of  Washington  ! ' ' 

That  is  why  Grant  did  come  out 
when  he  was  general-in-chief.  Better, 
far  better,  had  he  never  gone  back  as 
president.  Assuredly,  Sherman  knew 
him  very  well. 

Ceremonies  and  crowds  attended  him 
after  his  arrival  in  Washington  to  re 
ceive  his  new  rank.  His  actual  arrival 
with  his  little  boy  was  according  to  his 
own  inveterate  modesty.  Unheralded 
from  the  train  in  the  early  morning,  he 
waited  his  turn  behind  the  more  pushing 
travellers,  and  reached  the  hotel  book 
last.  Chittenden  has  told  us  how  the 
transfixed  hotel  clerk  changed  his  man 
ner  on  reading,  "U.  S.  Grant  and  son, 
Galena,  111."  Horace  Porter  records 
Lincoln's  cry  of  welcome  that  evening. 
John  Sherman  writes  to  his  brother  of 
the  adulations  in  Washington,  and  his 
fear  that  Grant  will  be  spoiled.  And 
Grant's  remark  to  Lincoln,  "Beally, 


100  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 
Mr.  President,  I  have  had  enough  of  the 
show  business/ '  completes  the  picture. 
No,  not  quite.  One  week  later,  when 
he  was  in  Nashville  arranging  with  Sher 
man  the  vast  concluding  process  of  the 
Eebellion,  the  "show  business/'  in  the 
shape  of  the  mayor  with  a  rosewood  box 
and  a  sword,  caught  him  again.  Sher 
man's  incomparably  brisk  pen  has  drawn 
the  scene:  "The  mayor  rose  and  in 
a  most  dignified  way  read  a  finished 
speech  to  General  Grant,  who  stood  as 
usual  very  awkwardly ;  and  the  mayor 
closed  his  speech  by  handing  him  the 
resolutions  of  the  city  council,  engrossed 
on  parchment,  with  a  broad  ribbon  and 
large  seal  attached.  After  the  mayor 
had  fulfilled  his  office  so  well,  General 
Grant  said,  '  Mr.  Mayor,  as  I  knew  that 
this  ceremony  was  to  occur,  and  as  I  am 
not  used  to  speaking,  I  have  written 
something  in  reply.'  He  then  began  to 
fumble  in  his  pockets,  first  his  breast- 
coat  pocket,  then  his  pants,  vest,  etc., 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  101 
and  after  a  considerable  delay  he  pulled 
out  a  crumpled  piece  of  common  yellow 
cartridge  paper,  which  he  handed  to  the 
mayor.  When  read,  his  answer  was 
most  excellent, — short,  concise,  and,  if 
delivered,  would  have  been  all  that  the 
occasion  required.  I  could  not  help 
laughing  at  a  scene  so  characteristic  of 
the  man  to  whom  all  had  turned  as  the 
only  one  to  guide  the  nation  in  a  war 
that  had  become  painfully  critical.77 

So  now  he  faced  the  conclusion.  From 
Cairo  in  1861  to  Chattanooga  in  1863  he 
had  marched  forward,  narrowing  the 
Confederacy  blow  after  blow.  Here, 
between  "Washington  and  Eichmond  — 
only  a  hundred  miles  —  blow  after  blow 
had  narrowed  nothing.  In  April,  1864, 
they  stood  as  they  had  started  in  April, 
1861.  Eichmond  was  still  to  be  taken, 
Lee  still  to  be  crushed.  Three  years, 
six  generals,  and  a  loss  of  one  hundred 
and  forty -four  thousand  men  had  failed 
to  do  this.  From  such  failure  Grant  re- 


102  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 
ceived  two  great  inheritances,  and  with 
them  succeeded.  His  inheritances  were 
to  have  his  own  way  unhampered  and 
the  control  of  a  perfect  instrument,  the 
army  of  the  Potomac  under  General 
Meade.  Grant7  s  detractors  lay  too  much 
stress  on  the  first  inheritance.  He  had 
his  own  way,  not  only  because  Lincoln 
had  at  length  learned  how  disastrous 
meddling  was,  but  also  because  Lincoln 
felt  in  his  marrow  that  here  was  a  man 
who  would  go  on  and  do  the  thing.  He 
had  met  no  such  man  till  now.  He  had 
been  looking  for  one  ceaselessly.  Upon 
the  Army  of  the  Potomac  and  General 
Meade  too  much  stress  cannot  be  laid. 
Without  that  engine  and  pilot  the  cap 
tain  would  have  wrecked  his  vessel  sev 
eral  times.  During  forty-eight  hours 
around  Spottsylvania  he  essayed  direc 
tion  of  the  tactics  himself,  and  wrought 
such  havoc  that  thereafter  he  allowed 
the  pilot  Meade  full  charge  of  this. 
We  may  feel  sure  that  Grant  under- 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  103 
rated  Lee  at  the  beginning.  He  had 
encountered  no  such  genius  in  the  West. 
His  remark  that  the  Army  of  the  Poto 
mac  had  never  been  "  fought  up  its  full 
capacity"  indicates  that  he  expected 
quicker  results  than  he  got.  And  the 
famous  sentence  from  his  letter  near 
Spottsylvania  on  May  11,  "I  propose  to 
fight  it  out  on  this  line  if  it  takes  all 
summer,"  plainly  shows  brief  anticipa 
tions.  It  took  until  the  following  April. 
And  in  his  own  report  one  reads  be 
tween  the  lines  something  like  an  apol 
ogy  for  these  terrible  battles.  He  says  : 
"Whether  they  might  have  been  better 
in  conception  and  execution  is  for  the 
people  who  mourn  the  loss  of  friends 
fallen,  and  who  have  to  pay  the  pecun 
iary  cost,  to  say.  All  I  can  say  is  that 
what  I  have  done  has  been  done  con 
scientiously,  to  the  best  of  my  ability, 
and  in  what  I  conceived  to  be  for  the 
best  interests  of  the  whole  country." 
His  conception  was  ' ( to  hammer  contin- 


104  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 
uously  .  .  .  until  by  mere  attrition" 
there  should  be  nothing  left  of  the  en 
emy.  He  reduced  the  problem,  not  to 
tl  Who  can  win  the  greatest  victories?" 
but  to  "Who  can  stand  the  heaviest 
losses'?"  To  state  it  thus  was  to  solve 
it.  It  was  not  military,  but  it  was 
deeply  sagacious.  It  was  like  Columbus 
and  the  egg.  It  was  also  a  confession 
of  Lee's  superiority.  The  fact  that  Lee 
had  the  interior  lines  is  not  sufficient 
counterbalance.  These  awful  battles  add 
not  to  Grant's,  but  to  Lee's  reputation. 

On  his  side,  Lee  evidently  underrated 
Grant.  He,  too,  had  been  used  to  other 
generals  —  generals  who  struck  a  blow 
and  then  sat  down.  But  it  was  never 
to  be  like  that  any  more. 

There  were  two  ways  for  Grant  to 
move  from  the  Potomac  on  land  to  Eieh- 
mond  :  by  the  right  flank,  westward  and 
inland  —  an  easier  country  to  fight  in, 
a  harder  line  of  communications  to 
cover  j  by  the  left  flank,  south-eastward, 


ULYSSES  S.  GEAKT  105 
nearer  the  water  —  a  harder  country, 
easier  communications. 

To  move  immediately  south  of  Rich 
mond  by  water  and  from  there  cut  its 
supporting  railroads  was  well  enough, 
provided  Lee  would  keep  himself  inside 
Bichmond's  fortifications  while  this  was 
going  on.  But  it  was  unlikely  he  would 
do  now  what  he  had  never  done  before. 
On  the  contrary,  he  could  be  expected 
so  to  enlarge  his  circumference  of  pro 
tection  that  to  envelop  him  would 
spread  the  army  out  too  thin,  and  bare 
its  extended  flanks  to  disadvantageous 
attack  while  fighting  for  possession  of 
the  radiating  railroads.  Moreover,  since 
Lee  had  to  be  bitterly  encountered  some 
where,  it  was  better  to  meet  him  further 
from  his  home  and  nearer  our  own  sup 
plies.  This,  too,  for  a  while  screened 
"Washington. 

Grant  moved  by  the  left  flank  May  3, 
choosing  a  midnight  start.  But  Lee  saw 
him  before  he  could  get  beyond  the  un- 


106         ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 
propitious    country,    and    compelled    a 
battle  May  5. 

On  that  beginning  day  the  two  crossed 
weapons,  both  of  perfect  steel.  Lee 
handled  his  like  a  great  swordsman : 
Grant  handled  his  like  a  great  black 
smith.  Lee  had  some  seventy  thousand 
men :  Grant,  some  one  hundred  and 
twenty  thousand.  Day,  and  often  night, 
the  weapons  struck  fire  at  some  point ; 
day  and  night,  during  not  weeks,  but 
months.  Some  of  these  clashes  have 
names  forever  reddened  with  slaughter, 
—  the  Wilderness,  Spottsylvania,  North 
Anna,  Cold  Harbor  ;  but  in  between 
them  flow  nameless  streams  of  blood 
continuously.  More  sublimely  shines 
the  American  volunteer  at  Cold  Har 
bor  than  at  Chattanooga, —  more  sub 
lime  in  walking  calmly  to  visible  death 
than  in  tumultuously  rushing  to  victory. 
He  stood  in  the  centre  with  the  enemy 
in  a  great  half- wheel  around  him,  and, 
knowing  that  some  one  had  blundered, 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  107 
walked  into  this.  First  he  wrote  his 
name  and  home,  and  fastened  the  ad 
dress  to  his  clothes.  Thus  they  would 
know  whose  body  it  was.  Then,  at  the 
word,  he  went.  Six  thousand  Union 
soldiers  were  killed  at  Cold  Harbor  in 
one  hour.  In  the  book  of  noble  deeds 
from  Thermopylae  down,  is  there  a  more 
heroic  page  than  this  I 

By  November  1  Grant  had  lost  eighty 
thousand  men  —  more  than  Lee  began 
with.  The  army  of  the  Potomac,  the 
weapon  of  fine  temper,  was  hacked  into 
a  saw  by  the  usage  it  had  received. 
JSTor  was  Lee  crushed  yet,  nor  Eichmond 
yet  taken.  In  Grant's  pictures  the  story 
is  plain;  the  saddened  eyes,  the  worn 
face,  the  mouth  shut  down  tight  all 
around.  The  heavy  strain  —  heavier 
these  months  than  Lincoln's  —  with  dis 
tant  campaigns  to  plan,  near  battles  to 
fight,  disloyal  politics  in  the  North,  and 
the  usual  popular  imbecile  clamour  for 
a  change  or  a  cessation,  bore  Grant  down 


108  ULYSSES  S.  GRANT 
inwardly.  He  carried  the  Union  on  Ms 
back ;  and  other  generals  had  failed 
him,  and  he  had  been  a  disappointment 
to  himself.  He  gave  in  to  drink,  it 
seems,  at  times.  Discovering  this,  Ben 
Butler  appears  to  have  blackmailed 
him.  He  had  requested  Butler's  re 
moval  for  bad  conduct  at  Petersburg. 
Butler  visited  him.  He  backed  down. 
Not  from  personal  fear.  The  Union 
cause  was  trembling  in  politics.  A  pub 
lic  tale  of  drink  might  remove  the  gen-, 
eral,  and  split  the  Union  forever.  Pres 
ently  Sherman's  and  Sheridan's  suc 
cesses  clinched  Lincoln's  election.  Next 
Butler  showed  incompetence  again. 
Then  Grant  dismissed  him.  Butler 
could  have  published  as  much  about 
drink  as  he  pleased.  The  Union  was 
safe.  Wound  up  in  this,  contemporane 
ously  rather  than  logically,  is  General 
W.  F.  Smith's  severe  fate.  Under  first 
impressions  of  him  received  at  Chat 
tanooga,  Grant  had  thought  him  worthy 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  109 
a  high,  command,  and  at  this  time  de 
signed  him  for  Butler7  s  successor.  But 
in  the  same  twenty-four  hours  with 
Butler's  blackmail,  General  Smith  criti 
cised  to  Grant's  face  the  battle  of  Cold 
Harbor.  Thinking  this  over,  it  struck 
Grant  that  General  Smith  had  meant  to 
"whip  him  over  Meade's  shoulder,"  as 
he  phrased  it.  He  relieved  his  campaign 
of  so  captious  a  subordinate.  It  was, 
perhaps,  advisable,  but  seems  harsh. 

Yet,  if  the  North  was  dismayed  by 
Grant's  destructive  battles,  still  more 
so  was  the  South.  They  felt  the  end 
coming.  Each  bloody  crisis  saw  Grant 
move  on.  Such  a  thing  had  not  been 
seen  before. 

Early' s  almost  successful  attempt  to 
take  Washington  did  not  frighten  Grant 
from  his  siege  of  Petersburg.  He  merely 
let  Sheridan  loose  upon  Early,  and  broke 
him.  That  also  settled  the  Shenandoah 
Valley,  Secession's  fertile  incubator  and 
truck  garden.  Sent  there  during  three 


110  ULYSSES  S.  GRANT 
years  to  handle  it  with  gloves,  our  sol 
diers  had  seen  it  so  periodically  that  they 
called  it  Harper's  Weekly.  At  length 
Sheridan,  though  inexcusably  brutal  in 
his  barn-burning,  yet,  in  destroying  crops 
and  forage,  merely  treated  the  valley  as 
it  should  have  been  treated  at  first.  But 
Secession  considered  that  Union  should 
fight  with  gloves.  When  Union  began 
to  fight  to  a  finish,  Secession  cried  out. 
Sheridan  is  still  denounced ;  but  Seces 
sion's  massacre  of  Fort  Pillow  and  burn 
ing  of  Chambersburg  are  not  mentioned. 
So  the  South  knew  that  in  Grant7  s 
deadly  grip  and  will  was  something  fate 
ful,  never  met  till  now.  And  that  grip 
was  seizing  it  elsewhere.  Besides  Sheri 
dan,  Sherman  was  closing  in  upon  it 
in  Georgia,  and  Thomas  soon  struck  it 
heavily  at  Nashville.  These  simulta 
neous  strides  of  disaster  had  all  been  set 
and  kept  in  motion  by  the  single  cen 
tral  will.  And,  no  matter  what  the  im 
patient  country  said,  the  president  stood 


ULYSSES  S.  GRANT  111 
Grant's  friend  through  thick  and  thin. 
The  Secretary  of  War  had  made  one  su 
preme  effort  to  maintain  his  dictatorship 
over  the  movements  of  the  army.  The 
report  of  his  fall  is  thus  :  Hearing  from 
Grant  that  certain  troops  were  to  be  dis 
posed  in  a  certain  way,  he  objected  that 
he  had  other  plans,  and  could  not  allow 
it.  Grant  said,  "But  the  order  has 
been  given. ' '  The  domineering  Stanton 
then  objected  much  more  ;  and  always, 
when  he  paused,  Grant  imperturbably  re 
plied,  "But  the  order  has  been  given." 
The  Secretary  rushed  to  Lincoln.  Lin 
coln  said,  "But  Congress  has  made  him 
general  of  all  the  armies. "  The  Secre 
tary  still  poured  himself  out  j  and  still 
the  deprecating  Lincoln  murmured  only, 
1 1  But  Congress  has  made  him  general  of 
all  the  armies.'7  There  it  stopped  per 
manently. 

And  Lincoln's  words  to  Grant  through 
this  time,  though  once  he  expresses  a 
hope  that  as  few  lives  as  possible  may  be 


112  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 
sacrificed,  show  his  deep  faith  and  his 
deep  satisfaction  in  his  aggressive,  in 
domitable  general.  In  August  he  writes: 
"The  particulars  of  your  campaign  I 
neither  know  nor  seek  to  know.  I  wish 
not  to  intrude  any  restraints  or  con 
straints  upon  you. ' '  Grant' s  reply  unites 
a  modesty  and  a  self-reliance  that  Lincoln 
had  not  heard  until  this  general  came : 
"  Should  my  success  be  less  than  I  desire 
or  expect,  the  least  I  can  say  is  the 
fault  is  not  yours. "  No  wonder  Lincoln 
liked  his  new  commander !  He  writes 
again,  when  less  firm  spirits  at  Washing 
ton  had  been  counselling  a  halt :  "  I  have 
seen  your  despatch  expressing  your  un 
willingness  to  break  your  hold  where 
you  are.  Neither  am  I  willing.  Hold 
on  with  a  bull- dog  grip,  and  chew  and 
choke  as  much  as  possible.'7 

The  withers  of  the  South  were  being 
wrung.  Side  failures  did  nothing  to  ob 
scure  the  looming  end.  The  great  blows 
of  Sherman,  Sheridan,  and  Thomas  sent 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  113 
their  shocks  to  the  heart  of  Secession  j 
and  at  the  heart  sat  Grant,  holding  Lee 
tight  in  Eichmond.  It  is  recorded  of 
his  ceaseless  work  at  this  period,  that  on 
one  day  he  wrote  forty-two  important 
despatches. 

This  winter  was  a  time  of  thought 
for  the  weary,  disenchanted  Southern 
people  and  a  time  of  desperation  on  the 
part  of  their  political  misleaders.  In 
early  February  some  of  these  had,  in 
good  faith,  visited  Grant  to  talk  of 
peace,  which  talk  he  had  tactfully 
evaded,  while  showing  them  all  hospi 
tality  at  his  headquarters.  With  tact 
still  greater  he  had  persuaded  Lincoln 
to  come  and  see  them  himself  instead  of 
sending  Seward  as  an  emissary.  But 
this  ended  in  nothing,  save  that  Grant's 
character  and  kindness  won  the  high 
admiration  of  the  Confederate  vice- 
president,  Stephens,  who  wrote  :  "He  is 
one  of  the  most  remarkable  men  I  ever 
met.  He  does  not  seem  to  be  aware  of 


114  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 
his  powers."  Presently  again  the  South 
asked  for  a  peace  talk,  this  time  through 
General  Lee,  who  addressed  Grant  in  a 
letter.  But  Grant  explained  that  terms 
of  peace  were  not  in  his  province;  that 
his  authority  allowed  him  to  act  only  re 
garding  military  subjects,  such  as  the 
exchange  of  prisoners.  And  the  mat 
ter  stopped  there.  Lee's  actions  and 
spirit  must  be  kept  wide  apart  from 
those  of  the  Secession  politicians  at  this 
time  and  at  all  times.  Under  the  inspi 
ration  of  Jefferson  Davis,  in  the  spring 
a  manifesto  issued  from  the  Confederate 
Congress,  which  struggled  to  goad  the 
people  to  further  efforts  and  sacrifices 
by  such  prophecies  as  follow:  If  the 
Union  won,  "not  only  would  the  prop 
erty  and  estates  of  vanquished  rebels  be 
confiscated,  but  they  would  be  divided 
and  distributed  among  our  African 
bondsmen. ?  >  u  Our  enemies  have  threat 
ened  to  deport  our  entire  white  popu 
lation,  and  supplant  it  with  a  new 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  115 
population  drawn  from  their  own  terri 
tories  and  from  European  countries." 
The  manifesto  further  says:  " Failure 
makes  us  vassals  of  an  arrogant  people. 
Failure  will  compel  us  to  drink  the  cup 
of  humiliation,  even  to  the  bitter  dregs 
of  having  the  history  of  our  struggle 
written  by  New  England  historians." 
But  even  this  excruciating  peril  seemed 
to  the  Southern  people,  whose  sons  were 
dead  and  whose  livelihood  was  gone,  a 
less  calamity  than  paying  a  thousand 
dollars  of  their  money  for  a  barrel  of 
flour,  and  seeing  their  white-haired 
fathers  and  fifteen-year-old  boys  now 
forcibly  thrown  into  the  mill  of  blood. 
They  wanted  peace.  They  began  to  see 
in  Jefferson  Davis  and  his  associates,  not 
a  group  of  patriots,  but  a  heartless,  self 
ish,  unscrupulous  gang  of  intriguers. 
They  began  to  go  home  from  the  army. 
There  was  no  pay  and  no  food  for  those 
who  devotedly  remained  faithful  to  Lee. 
Grant  was  closing  in.  On  April  3  Lee 


116  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 
had  to  break  cover,  and  retreat  from 
Eichmond.  Davis  fled  southward  ;  and, 
even  while  flying,  and  with  full  knowl 
edge  of  the  crumbling  house,  he  made 
another  speech,  to  lure,  if  possible,  more 
victims  to  the  slaughter.  "We  have 
now  entered  upon  a  new  phase  of  the 
struggle,'7  he  said.  " Eelieved  from  the 
necessity  of  guarding  particular  points, 
our  army  will  be  free  to  move  from 
point  to  point,  to  strike  the  enemy  in 
detail  far  from  his  base." 

Few  could  have  believed  him.  But 
the  soldiers,  ragged  and  starved,  followed 
and  fought  under  their  beloved  Lee 
across  the  rainy  fields  of  Virginia. 

No  successes  now  changed  a  muscle 
of  Grant's  impassive  face.  Nothing  but 
the  capture  of  prisoners  wakened  visible 
elation  in  him.  Each  prisoner  meant 
one  enemy  less  to  fight,  one  more  life 
saved  from  fruitless  sacrifice.  Of  his 
thoughts,  only  his  actions  show  anything. 
When  leaving  headquarters  at  City  Point 


ULYSSES  S.  GEANT  117 
on  March  29  for  this  last  struggle,  he 
bade  his  wife  good-by  with  more  than 
his  daily  tenderness,  which  was  always 
great.  He  kissed  her  again  and  again 
at  the  door,  as  though  their  next  meet 
ing  might  never  be,  or  would  not  be 
until  after  much  had  happened.  Then 
Lincoln  walked  to  the  train  with  him, 
said,  "God  bless  you  all ! "  with  an  un 
steady  voice,  and  they  moved  away  to 
begin  the  taking  of  Eichmond.  "The 
President,"  said  Grant,  "is  one  of  the 
few  who  have  not  attempted  to  extract 
from  me  a  knowledge  of  my  movements, 
although  he  is  the  only  one  who  has  a 
right  to  know  them." 

Eain  fell  the  next  day  and  dulled  the 
army's  spirits,  but  weather  made  no 
change  in  the  quiet  general.  And  Sheri 
dan  rode  in  through  the  rain  from  his 
cavalry  to  headquarters,  talked  with  the 
staff  and  with  Grant,  and  departed  to 
his  coming  battles  like  a  meteor,  leaving 
a  trail  of  fired  enthusiasm  behind  him. 


118  ULYSSES  S.  GKAOT 
To  this  star  in  these  final  days  the  great 
wagon  of  the  army  seemed  hitched. 
"Whatever  they  separately  did, —  and 
they  were  doing  something  during  every 
hour, — the  fierce  white  light  of  Sheri 
dan's  genius  beats  upon  the  whole  ;  and 
his  deeds  against  the  enemy  are  like 
strokes  of  lightning.  On  the  morning 
of  April  3  Lincoln  came  to  Grant  in 
captured  Petersburg,  and  shook  his  hand 
and  poured  out  his  thanks  a  long  while. 
He  said  this  was  something  like  his  ex 
pectations,  only  that  he  had  imagined 
Sherman  would  have  been  brought  from 
the  South  to  share  in  it.  Then  he  learned 
more  of  his  general's  tact,  for  Grant  told 
him  it  was  justice  that  the  army  which 
fought  Lee  from  the  beginning  should 
fight  him  at  the  end  and  divide  the  glory 
with  no  one.  Thus  there  could  be  no 
rancour.  The  close  partisans  of  Meade, 
bitter  over  the  great  slight  which  history 
has  so  far  done  his  fame,  contend  that 
he  should  have  received  the  final  sur- 


ULYSSES  S.  GRANT  119 
render;  but  a  later  generation  must 
think  that  this  belonged  to  the  general- 
in-chief.  Had  Grant's  brooding  mind 
been  occupied  with  any  thoughts  save 
how  best  to  end  the  matter  and  how  best 
to  be  merciful  to  the  vanquished,  he 
could  scarcely  be  excused.  But  he 
thought  neither  of  himself  nor  of  any 
other  of  the  victors.  So  he  and  Lincoln 
talked  together  awhile  at  Petersburg, 
and  understood  each  other  well ;  for  one 
thought  filled  them  both, — leniency. 
Then  Grant  went  forward,  and  learned 
of  Richmond's  fall.  But  no  wish  to 
enter  and  gloat  over  his  prize  was  in  the 
conqueror's  heart.  As  he  had  asked  at 
Donelson,  Why  humiliate  a  brave  enemy? 
and  as  at  Vicksburg,  he  had  forbidden  a 
cheer  to  be  raised  over  the  surrendered, 
or  any  taunt  made  as  they  passed,  so  now 
he  avoided  Richmond ;  and  Lee's  last 
march  went  on.  The  good  deeds  and 
the  exploits  of  Sheridan's  cavalry  spurred 
the  infantry  to  a  race.  The  pursuit 


120  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 
quickened  ;  and  Sheridan,  striking  blow 
on  blow  at  the  front,  forever  called  back 
for  greater  speed.  Lee  must  not  escape 
to  Danville.  Lee  must  be  headed  off, 
and  compelled  to  fight  again.  Newhall, 
of  Sheridan's  staff,  writes:  "All  along 
the  road  were  evidences  of  the  demorali 
sation  of  the  enemy.  Flankers  and 
scouting  parties  of  cavalry  were  con 
tinually  bringing  in  scores  of  prisoners 
from  the  woods  on  either  side, — pris 
oners  who  would  throw  down  their 
arms  at  the  sight  of  blue  uniforms  and 
request  to  be  captured.  The  steadfast 
women  who  begged  them  to  turn  back 
and  face  us  again  had  been  laughed  to 
scorn." 

At  dark  on  April  5  word  came  from 
Sheridan  to  Grant:  " I  wish  you  were 
here.  I  see  no  escape  for  General  Lee." 
Grant  called  for  his  horse,  and  rode 
through  the  night  to  Sheridan  and 
Meade.  And  on  the  next  day  at  Sai 
lor's  Creek  the  clouds  sank  lower  round 


ULYSSES  S.  GEAXT  121 
Lee.  Again  Grant's  actions  reveal  Ms 
thoughts.  On  Friday,  April  7,  he 
wrote  Lee  :  "The  last  week  must  con 
vince  you  of  the  hopelessness  of  further 
resistance.  I  regard  it  as  my  duty  to 
shift  from  myself  the  responsibility  of 
any  further  effusion  of  blood  by  asking 
of  you  the  surrender  of  the  arniy  of 
Northern  Virginia.''  The  unsuccessful 
battles,  the  dwindling  regiments,  the 
starvation,  the  retreat  cut  off, —  all  this 
was  plainly  the  end ;  and  it  stared  Lee 
in  the  face.  But  on  such  a  sight  Lee 
had  not  at  first  the  moral  strength  to 
open  his  eyes.  The  pain  was  too  blind 
ing.  In  his  youth  he  had  taken  an  oath 
to  support  the  government.  That  gov 
ernment  had  educated  him  to  be  a  sol 
dier.  He  had  been  against  Secession. 
But,  when  the  time  came  to  choose  be 
tween  Secession  and  his  oath,  he  chose 
(not  without  reluctance)  to  break  his 
oath,  and  turn  against  the  government 
the  teaching  it  had  given  him.  And 


122  ULYSSES  S.  GHA  NT 
now  here  he  sat,  with  his  lost  cause  like 
a  broken  idol  in  his  hands.  For  a  mo 
ment  he  shrank  from  the  final  pang  of 
renunciation.  "I  have  received  your 
note,"  he  replied  to  Grant  on  that  same 
Friday.  u  Though  not  entertaining  the 
opinion  you  express  of  the  hopelessness 
of  further  resistance,  I  reciprocate  your 
desire  to  avoid  useless  effusion  of  blood, 
and  therefore  ask  the  terms  you  will 
offer."  And  Grant  on  Saturday  re 
plied,  "  Peace  being  my  great  desire, 
there  is  but  one  condition  —  that  the 
men  and  officers  surrendered  shall  be 
disqualified  for  taking  up  arms  until 
properly  exchanged."  And  then  fol 
lows  a  touch  of  his  perfect  consideration 
for  the  defeated  opponent :  "I  will  meet 
you  or  will  designate  officers  to  meet 
any  officers  you  may  name."  So  did 
Washington  write  to  Cornwallis,  as 
Horace  Porter  reminds  us.  But  Lee 
would  himself  go  through  with  whatever 
had  to  conie.  Only  still  he  pushed  the 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  123 
bitter  cup  away  from  him.  "  I  cannot 
meet  you  with  a  view  to  surrender, ' r  he 
answered  ;  "but,  as  far  as  your  proposal 
may  tend  to  the  restoration  of  peace,  I 
shall  be  pleased  to  meet  you.'7  And 
he  named  Sunday  morning,  on  the  old 
stage-road  between  the  picket  lines. 

This  disappointing  word  came  to 
Grant  in  the  heart  of  the  night,  where 
he  lay  sleepless  from  many  hours  of  pain 
in  his  head.  Hunger,  fatigue,  exposure, 
and  strain  had  brought  on  such  torments 
that  he  had  allowed  remedies  to  be  tried, 
but  without  avail.  He  lay  down  again. 
In  the  early  hours  he  was  found  walking 
up  and  down  outside,  holding  his  head 
with  both  hands.  He  now  wrote  a  third 
time  to  Lee  that  he  had  no  authority  to 
treat  of  peace,  but  that  peace  could  be 
had,  and  lives  and  property  saved,  by 
the  South' s  laying  down  their  arms. 
An  urgency,  almost  an  appeal,  pervades 
this  letter.  He  then  declined  advice  to 
take  an  ambulance  for  the  sake  of  his 


124  ULYSSES  S.  GBANT 
severe  pain,  and,  mounting  once  more, 
proceeded  toward  Sheridan's  front.  It 
was  near  noon  now ;  and,  as  he  went,  a 
despatch  overtook  him.  Time  and  fur 
ther  mischances  had  brought  Lee  to  the 
point.  He  requested  an  interview  for 
the  purpose  of  surrender  according  to 
the  terms  offered.  As  Grant  read  and 
understood  that  here  in  his  hand  at  last 
lay  peace,  all  pain  left  him.  He  dis 
mounted,  and  by  the  roadside  wrote  his 
answer.  While  he  was  doing  this, 
and  hurrying  forward  to  the  meeting, 
Lee  some  six  miles  away  lay  waiting. 
Stretched  on  a  blanket  under  an  apple- 
tree  by  the  road,  he  contemplated  the 
sunshine  that  bathed  Virginia.  Of  his 
thoughts,  also,  only  his  actions  reveal 
anything.  "When  Grant's  note  reached 
him,  he  rose,  and  had  soon  ridden  into 
Appomattox  Court-house,  and  in  a 
house  there  waited  for  Grant.  In  a 
little  while  Grant  reached  the  grassy 
village  street ;  and  there,  dismounted, 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  125 
stood  Sheridan  and  others.  No  signifi 
cant  words  were  spoken  in  this  hour. 
Silence  is  the  only  reference  that  men 
make  to  great  events  which  they  are  in 
the  midst  of.  The  ordinary  greetings 
of  every  day  were  briefly  given.  The 
house  where  General  Lee  waited  was 
pointed  out  to  Grant  j  and  he  went  in, 
leaving  most  of  the  others  upon  the 
porch.  There  they  sat,  while  General 
Lee's  grey  horse  cropped  the  grass  near 
them.  Quietness  was  over  the  little 
village  and  the  armies  lying  in  the 
country  round.  The  door  opened,  and 
two  of  those  on  the  porch  were  signed  to 
come  in.  They  entered,  it  is  said,  tread 
ing  as  those  do  who  steal  into  a  sick- 
chamber,  while  the  rest  still  sat  on  the 
porch.  When  the  door  next  opened, 
they  rose.  For  out  of  it  General  Lee 
came,  splendid,  tall,  grey-bearded,  im 
movable.  They  looked  at  him  and  his 
sword  and  spotless  grey  uniform.  He 
stood  absently  on  the  step,  gazing  away 


126  ULYSSES  S.  GRANT 
across  Virginia  j  and  two  or  three  times 
he  struck  one  hand  against  the  other. 
Then,  having  spoken  no  word,  and  no 
ticing  his  grey  horse  that  had  been 
brought  him,  he  mounted,  and  rode 
away.  As  he  was  going,  Grant  came 
through  the  door,  saluted  him  in  silence, 
and  in  silence  also  rode  away.  "When 
Lee  reached  his  army,  the  faithful  men 
swarmed  around  him,  cheering  not  their 
common  misfortune,  but  the  peace  that 
he  had  made.  They  mingled  their  grief 
with  his,  grasping  his  hands  ;  and  then, 
almost  overcome,  he  spoke:  "Men,  we 
have  fought  through  the  war  together. 
I  have  done  the  best  I  could  for  you." 

What  Grant's  features  concealed  on 
that  day  we  know  now  from  him : 
"What  General  Lee's  feelings  were  I  do 
not  know.  But  my  own,  which  had 
been  quite  jubilant  on  the  receipt  of  his 
letter,  were  sad  and  depressed.  I  felt 
like  anything  rather  than  rejoicing  at 
the  downfall  of  a  foe  who  had  fought  so 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  127 
long  and  valiantly,  and  had  suffered  so 
much  for  a  cause,  though  that  cause  was, 
I  believe,  one  of  the  worst  for  which  a 
people  ever  fought,  and  one  for  which 
there  was  the  least  excuse. " 

But,  inside  the  house,  what  had  gone 
on  between  the  two  chiefs?  The  wit 
nesses  watched  and  moved  always  with 
the  hush  of  a  sick-room.  And  after  the 
first  greeting,  when  they  sat  down,  it 
became  Grant  who  shrank  from  the 
point.  He  talked  to  Lee  about  Mexico 
and  old  times,  and  how  good  peace  was 
going  to  be  now  ;  and  twice  Lee  had  to 
remind  him  of  the  business  they  had  to 
do.  Then  Grant  wrote,  as  always,  simple 
and  clear  words.  In  the  middle,  his  eye 
fell  upon  Lee's  beautiful  sword  ;  and  the 
chivalric  act  which  it  prompted  has 
knighted  his  own  spirit  forever.  "The 
surrender/7  he  instantly  wrote,  "would 
not  embrace  the  side-arms  of  the  officers, 
nor  their  private  horses  or  baggage." 
When  Lee's  eyes  reached  that  sentence, 


128  ULYSSES  S.  GEANT 
his  face  changed  for  the  first  time  j  and 
he  said,  1 1  This  will  have  a  very  happy 
effect  upon  my  army."  He  then  told 
what  was  new  to  Grant,  that  the  horses 
ridden  by  the  men  were  their  own. 
Again  the  conqueror's  tenderness  lifted 
him  into  a  realm  diviner  than  the  re 
nown  of  victory.  He  ordered  that  the 
men  "take  the  animals  home  with  them 
to  work  their  little  farms."  To  this 
nobility  Lee's  own  responded.  "This 
will  have  the  best  possible  effect  upon 
the  men,"  he  said.  Moved  to  greater 
frankness,  he  told  Grant  of  his  army's 
hunger  ;  and  for  this  also  Grant  at  once 
provided.  These  are  the  things  which 
the  conqueror  had  done  when  he  came 
out  of  the  house  with  unrelaxed  counte 
nance,  and  rode  away.  As  he  went,  he 
heard  firing  from  his  lines.  It  was  in 
honour  of  the  news,  already  spreading. 
He  stopped  these  salutes  at  once.  "The 
war  is  over,"  he  said.  "The  rebels  are 
our  countrymen  again." 


ULYSSES   S.  GRANT         129 

Thus,  when  his  strength  had  quelled 

the  four  years'  storm,  did  a  rainbow  rise 

from  his  great  heart  across  the  heavens 

of  our  native  land. 


VI. 

even  if  space  were  left,  should  his 
after  days  be  told.  It  is  not  for  them 
that  we  remember  and  bless  him.  The 
further  we  recede  from  him,  the  more 
they  sink  away  and  leave  him  shining 
in  his  greatness  at  Appomattox,  a  hero 
in  a  soldier's  dress,  with  sword  not 
drawn,  but  sheathed.  There  his  figure 
stands  immortal,  and  there  his  real  life 
ends.  For  living  is  action  up  to  the 
soul's  highest  excellence,  and  many  who 
eat  their  three  meals  a  day  are  dead  as 
door-nails.  Grant  rose  to  his  full  height 
again  only  when  he  came  to  die.  As 
president,  he  was  no  more  himself  than 
he  had  been  when  tanning  leather.  Men 
far  less  worthy  have  sat  more  worthily 
in  the  White  House.  It  was  foretold  — 
silently.  Sherman,  his  dear  friend,  was 
set  against  it,  and  would  not  say  a  word 
for  it.  Did  he  not  know  the  world's 
great  soldiers,  and  what  babies  they  be- 


ULYSSES  S.  GBAJSTT  131 
came  as  statesmen, — Wellington  latest 
of  all?  More  still,  he  knew  his  friend. 
But  we  Americans,  the  most  consist 
ently  inconsistent  people  on  earth,  have 
passed  a  century  in  abusing  our  army, 
and  in  electing  every  military  hero 
we  could  get  for  president :  Washing 
ton,  Jackson,  Harrison,  Taylor,  Grant. 
When  Lincoln  was  taken  from  us,  no 
man  was  so  loved  as  Grant ;  and,  there 
fore,  without  asking  or  caring  to  know 
how  he  could  have  learned  statesman 
ship,  in  our  gratitude  we  twice  gave  him 
the  greatest  gift  we  have. 

Before  this  happened,  his  straightfor 
ward  goodness  and  the  power  that  he 
had  did  much  to  heal  the  scars  of  war. 
Andrew  Johnson  wanted  Lee  tried  for 
treason,  and  Grant  stopped  it  by  threat 
ening  to  resign  his  commission.  In  those 
days  the  Southern  General  Taylor  writes 
of  him :  "He  came  frequently  to  see  me, 
was  full  of  kindness,  and  anxious  to  pro 
mote  my  wishes.  His  action  had  en- 


132  ULYSSES  S.  GKAKT 
deared  him  to  all  Southern  men.  His 
bearing  and  conduct  at  this  time  were 
admirable,  modest,  and  generous.  He 
declared  his  ignorance  of  and  distrust 
for  politics  and  politicians,  with  which 
and  whom  he  intended  to  have  nothing 
to  do." 

Certainly,  Johnson  did  not  better 
Grant's  opinion  of  politicians  —  nor  did 
those  men  who  now  led  the  South  far 
and  wide  astray  from  the  noble  spirit  of 
Lee  at  Appomattox.  Their  continued 
malignity  lost  them  a  great  chance,  and 
cost  the  South  dear.  Following  their 
manifesto  at  Eichmond,  already  quoted, 
they  now  met  each  step  of  clemency  with 
a  temper  which  is  completely  heralded 
in  the  words  of  Henry  A.  Wise  when  he 
surrendered:  "We  won't  be  forgiven. 
We  hate  you,  and  that  is  the  whole  of 
it ! "  They  now,  with  an  arrogance 
which  our  language  has  no  word  to  ex 
press,  demanded  to  return  to  Congress 
on  the  old  slave  ratio.  This  gave  white 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  133 
owners  the  benefit  of  their  slaves  by  add 
ing  three-fifths  of  the  number  of  the 
black  non- voting  population  to  the  sum 
of  the  white  voting  population.  Slaves 
were  free  now,  but  this  was  the  arrange 
ment  which  the  South  proposed  to  con 
tinue.  Let  the  reader  pause,  and  take  it 
in.  Johnson,  for  personal  reasons,  en 
couraged  it,  and  alarmed  Congress. 
Naturally,  the  North  lost  patience  ;  and 
Grant  lost  his  patience,  too.  This  swept 
away  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  an 
admirable  device  by  which  any  State 
could  deny  a  vote  to  a  part  of  its  male 
population  on  condition  that  its  represen 
tation  in  Congress  was  proportionately  re 
duced.  This  elastic  remedy,  which  held 
hope,  was  destroyed  by  the  precipitate 
deplorable  blunder  of  the  Fifteenth 
Amendment,  the  evils  of  which  have 
stained  our  soil  with  increasing  blood 
each  year,  and  developed  that  barbar 
ism  of  which  the  South  has  had  too 
great  a  share  from  the  beginning.  But, 


134  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 
when  leaders  came  to  Grant  offering  him 
the  presidency,  either  he  forgot  his 
opinion  of  politics,  or  (and  signs  point 
to  this)  he  thought  (as  another  hero  has 
thought  since)  that  being  president  was 
an  easy  matter.  None  of  us  can  measure 
such  a  temptation  without  having  it. 
As  General  Taylor  writes,  "Perhaps 
none  but  a  divine  being  can  resist  such 
a  temptation.77 

Strange,  very  strange,  is  Grant7  s  con 
duct  after  his  election.  He  left  the 
world.  He  went  into  a  sort  of  retreat 
at  Galena.  He  would  see  no  party 
leaders.  He  ordered  no  letter  sent  to 
him.  He  would  make  no  speeches.  He 
disclosed  his  plans  to  no  one.  We  can 
only  guess  his  thoughts  during  this  time 
by  his  acts  following  it.  They  were 
honest  —  and  helpless.  Evidently,  he 
wished  to  govern  without  politics,  as  he 
had  made  war  without  politics.  He 
wished  to  choose  men  as  he  had  chosen 
generals  —  for  their  fitness  as  he  judged 


ULYSSES  S.  GKANT  135 
them.  He  did  not  perceive  the  vast 
difference :  that  war  at  once  lays  bare 
a  soldier's  fitness  to  the  bone,  while 
peace  may  hide  incompetence  and  dis 
honesty  for  many  years.  As  an  illustra 
tion  of  Grant's  total  blindness  to  the 
proprieties  of  civil  government,  his 
choosing  Mr.  Stewart  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury  will  serve.  He  very  naturally 
thought  so  great  a  merchant  would  fill 
the  place  well.  He  appointed  him  with 
out  consulting  him.  The  Senate  con 
firmed  the  appointment.  Then  a  law 
was  discovered  forbidding  men  in  for 
eign  trade  to  hold  this  position.  Grant 
asked  to  have  the  law  changed  ! 

But  we  will  not  dwell  upon  his  many 
improprieties  of  administration  —  fa 
vouritism,  too  constant  acceptance  of 
presents,  too  great  obstinacy  in  forcing 
his  notions,  invincible  misunderstanding 
of  the  difference  between  a  lieutenant 
general  and  a  president.  It  may  be  said 
that,  when  he  happened  upon  good 


136  ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 
guides,  such  as  Hamilton  Fish,  his  acts 
were  wise,  as  in  the  Alabama  case,  where 
he  was  as  right  as  Sumner  was  wrong, 
or  as  in  his  courageous  veto  of  the  infla 
tion  bill  in  1874.  When  he  listened  to 
thieves  and  impostors,  as  in  the  San 
Domingo  matter,  his  acts  were  mistaken 
and  dangerous.  And,  alas  !  unchanged 
from  his  childhood  innocence  revealed 
in  the  horse  story,  he  remained  such  a 
mark  for  thieves  and  impostors  that  he 
came  to  sit  in  a  sort  of  centre  of  corrup 
tion,  credulous  to  the  bitter  end.  For 
the  end  was  the  bitterest  of  all. 

After  his  second  term,  when  he  had 
gone  round  the  world,  and  met  most  of 
the  great  people  in  it,  and  returned  man 
enough  of  the  world  to  remark  humour 
ously  that  at  Windsor  Queen  Victoria 
had  been  too  anxious  to  put  him  at  his 
ease,  and  after  his  unwilling  candidacy 
for  a  third  term  had  been  frustrated,  — 
after  all  his  experience,  he  fell  a  dupe  to 
a  Wall  Street  gambler.  He  became  a 


ULYSSES  S.  GRANT  137 
special  partner.  His  name  was  used  to 
further  a  brazen  scheme  of  thievery. 
Into  the  business  he  put  a  hundred  thou 
sand  dollars,  and  drew  two  and  three 
thousand  a  month  income  without  won 
dering  how  such  returns  could  be. 
When  the  crash  came  on  May  6,  1884,  it 
was  inconceivable  to  the  world  at  first 
that  he  was  not  guilty.  Presently  by  his 
conduct  and  statements,  by  his  making 
over  to  his  creditor,  Mr.  Yanderbilt,  all 
the  property  that  he  owned,  and  refusing 
Mr.  Vanderbilt's  generous  attempts  to 
give  it  back  to  him,  the  world  recognised 
his  innocence.  Help  was  offered  this 
ex-president  who  had  not  now  enough 
money  to  pay  the  milkman.  Most 
touchingly,  a  stranger,  Mr.  Wood,  sent 
him  instantly  five  hundred  dollars,  and 
soon  five  hundred  more,  as  his  share  of 
the  nation's  debt  to  him.  More  elabo 
rate  attempts  to  assist  him  were  begun, 
but  he  rejected  them.  And  under  the 
whole  shock  his  body  gave  way.  But 


138  ULYSSES  S.  GRANT 
his  spirit  rose.  He  was  asked  to  write 
war  articles,  and  presently  was  able  to 
pay  Mr.  Wood  with  the  first-fruits  of 
his  pen.  Then  for  weeks,  sometimes  in 
such  torture  from  the  cancer  in  his  throat 
that  drinking  water  was  like  swallowing 
molten  lead  to  him,  he  fought  death 
away  while  he  wrote  his  memoirs.  The 
tribute  of  the  country  in  making  him 
general  once  more  on  March  4,  1885, 
deeply  pleased  him  ;  but  he  was  shaken 
by  it,  and  grew  worse.  Eeviving,  how 
ever,  his  vast  will  pushed  on  with  the 
book,  in  order  to  leave  something  for  his 
wife's  support.  He  had  no  voice  any 
more,  but  whispered  his  dictation,  and 
wrote  on  days  when  he  was  strong 
enough.  He  held  death  away  until  the 
book  was  finished,  and  then  gave  death 
leave  to  come.  In  June  he  had  been 
taken  up  the  Hudson  Eiver  to  Mount 
McGregor,  near  Saratoga,  from  his  New 
York  house.  His  eyes  followed  West 
Point  as  the  train  passed  by  it.  On 


ULYSSES  S.  GBANT  139 
July  3  his  old  friend  Buckner,  of  Donel- 
son,  came  affectionately  to  bid  him  fare 
well  j  and  he  spoke  of  his  happiness  in 
the  growing  harmony  between  North 
and  South.  On  July  9,  in  a  trembling 
pencil,  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Wood :  "I  am 
glad  to  say  that,  while  there  is  much  un 
blushing  wickedness  in  this  world,  yet 
there  is  a  compensating  generosity  and 
grandeur  of  soul.  In  my  case  I  have 
not  found  that  republics  are  ungrateful, 
nor  are  the  people. "  On  July  23  he 
died.  To  pay  his  debts,  he  had  so 
utterly  stripped  himself  of  all  his 
trophies  and  possessions  that  there  was 
not  left  a  uniform  to  clothe  his  body  or 
a  sword  to  lay  upon  his  coffin.  To-day 
he  rests  in  his  tomb  at  Eiverside.  But 
his  greatest  visible  monument  is  the 
book.  Quite  apart  from  its  history, 
which  here  and  there  needs  amendment, 
and  quite  independent  of  its  masterly 
prose,  it  is  a  picture  of  a  noble,  modest, 
great  heart. 


140         ULYSSES  S.  GKANT 

As  Lincoln  asked  Grant  after  Corinth, 
1 '  How  does  it  all  sum  up  I ' ?  Let  poetry, 
which  is  the  summing  of  all  substance, 
reply :  — 

"My  good  blade  carves  the  casques  of 

men, 

My  tough  lance  thrusteth  sure, 
My  strength  is  as  the  strength  of  ten, 
Because  my  heart  is  pure." 


BIBLIOGBAPHY. 

Since  even  the  important  Grant  litera 
ture  offers  a  pilgrimage  of  reading  such 
as  few  have  leisure  to  undertake,  those 
books  most  directly  and  compactly  au 
thentic  or  remunerative  have  been 
marked  with  a  star.  Works  of  contro 
versy  are  not  included.  Several  vol 
umes,  once  conspicuous,  are  omitted  be 
cause  of  their  present  trifling  value.  It 
is  impracticable  to  enumerate  many 
documents, — Sumner's  speeches,  for  ex 
ample, —  essential  though  they  be  to  the 
student. 

I.  GRANT   AND    HIS   CAMPAIGNS.      By 
Henry    Coppe"e.       (New    York,    1866: 
Charles    B.    Eichardson.)     By   far   the 
best  of  the  early  military  biographies. 

II.  WITH  GENERAL  SHERIDAN  IN 
LEE'S  LAST  CAMPAIGN.     By  a  staff  offi 
cer    [F.    C.    Newhall].      (Philadelphia, 
1866  :  J.  B.  Lippincott  Company.)    The 


142  BIBLIOGEAPHY 

most  vivid  story  of  the  cavalry  battles 

yet  told. 

III.  *  PERSONAL  HISTORY  OF  ULYSSES 
S.  GRANT.     By  Albert  D.  Bichardson. 
(Hartford,  Conn.,  1868  :  American  Pub 
lishing    Company.)      Full   of  anecdote 
and  interest.     On  the  whole,  better  than 
either  its  contemporaries  or  its  followers. 

IV.  MILITARY    HISTORY   OF    ULYSSES 
S.  GRANT.     By  Adam  Badeau.     (New 
York,  1868-81 :  D.  Appleton  &  Co.)    A 
pompous  third-rate  production,  and  un 
trustworthy. 

V.  THE   VIRGINIA   CAMPAIGN  OF  '64 
AND  '65.     By  Andrew  A.  Humphreys. 
(New  York,  1883  :    Charles  Scribner's 
Sons. )     The  admirable  temper  and  abil 
ity  of  this  book  place  it  far  above  any 
military  narrative  thus  far  written  in 
this  country. 

VI.  *  PERSONAL    MEMOIRS    OF    U.    S. 
GRANT.      Two  volumes.      (New  York, 


BIBLIOGEAPHY  143 

1885-86 :  Charles  L.  Webster  &  Co. ; 
Century  Company,  1895.)  This  great- 
book  has  been  already  spoken  of  in 
the  text.  With  it  should  be  read  the 
Memoirs  of  Sherman  and  Sheridan. 
They  make  a  trilogy  that  will  outlast 
any  criticism. 

VII.  GRANT    IN    PEACE.      By    Adam 
Badeau.     (Hartford,  Conn.,  1887  :  S.  S. 
Scranton  &  Co. )     Contains  much  that  is 
trivial,  but  much  that  is  valuable. 

VIII.  HISTORICAL  ESSAYS.     By  Henry 
Adams.     The   four    last   essays.     (New 
York,  1891:    Charles  Scribner's  Sons.) 
There  is  no  better  summary  of  pertinent 
political  issues. 

IX.  MR.    FISH    AND    THE    ALABAMA 
CLAIMS.     By  J.  C.  B.  Davis.     (Boston 
and  New  York,  1893  :  Houghton,  Mifflin 
&  Co.)     Another  excellent  and  absorb 
ing  summary. 

X.  THE    STORY  OF  THE  CIYIL  WAR. 
By  John  Codman  Eopes.     (New  York, 


144  BIBLIOGEAPHY 

1894-98:  G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons.)  Un 
finished.  The  reader  may  always  trust 
Mr.  Eopes's  information,  but  not  always 
his  judgment. 

XI.  HISTORY  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES 
FROM  THE  COMPROMISE  OF  1850.     Vol 
umes   III.    and    IV.     By    James    Ford 
Ehodes.     (New  York,  1895-99  :  Harper 
Brothers.)      Unfinished.      This  work  is 
steadily  taking  the  features  of  a  classic. 
No  writer  of  any    period  of  our  his 
tory  combines  so  many  gifts, — interest, 
weight,  thoroughness,  serenity. 

XII.  THE  HISTORY  OF  THE  LAST  QUAR 
TER-CENTURY  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES 
(1870-95).     Volume  I.     By  Elisha  Ben 
jamin    Andrews.      (New   York,    1896 : 
Charles   Scribner's    Sons.)      Entertain 
ing,  undigested,  readable.     A  good  car 
toon  of  the  period. 

XIII.  *  CAMPAIGNING   WITH   GRANT. 
By     General     Horace    Porter,    LL.D. 
(New  York,   1897 :  The  Century  Com- 


BIBLIOGEAPHY  145 

pany. )  An  engaging  and  charming 
book.  Grant's  personality  is  nowhere 
better  drawn. 

XIV.  A   BIRD'S-EYE   VIEW    OF    OUR 
CIVIL    WAR.      By    Theodore   Ayrault 
Dodge.     (Boston  and  New  York,  1897  : 
Houghton,  Mifflin  &  Co. )     As  a  book  of 
quick  reference,  a  table  of  contents,  so 
to  speak,   the  reader  will  find  this  of 
great  help  —  as  did  the  writer. 

XV.  BATTLES   AND  LEADERS  OF  THE 
CIVIL    WAR.      Four    volumes.      (New 
York,  1897:    The  Century  Company.) 
This  contains  almost  everything  its  title 
indicates,  and  is  of  permanent  value. 

XVI.  *THE    MISSISSIPPI   VALLEY   IN 
THE    CIVIL    WAR.       By    John    Piske. 
Boston  and  New  York,  1900  :   Hough- 
ton,  Mifflin  &  Co. )     This  is  an  essential 
book  to  read,  and  as  delightful  as  it  is 
necessary. 


THE  BEACON  BIOGRAPHIES. 

M.  A.  DEWOLFE  HOWE,  Editor. 


The  aim  of  this  series  is  to  furnish  brief,  read 
able,  and  authentic  accounts  of  the  lives  of  those 
Americans  whose  personalities  have  impressed 
themselves  most  deeply  on  the  character  and 
history  of  their  country.  On  account  of  the 
length  of  the  more  formal  lives,  often  running 
into  large  volumes,  the  average  busy  man  and 
woman  have  not  the  time  or  hardly  the  inclina 
tion  to  acquaint  themselves  with  American  bi 
ography.  In  the  present  series  everything  that 
such  a  reader  would  ordinarily  care  to  know  is 
given  by  writers  of  special  competence,  who 
possess  in  full  measure  the  best  contemporary 
point  of  view.  Each  volume  is  equipped  with 
a  frontispiece  portrait,  a  calendar  of  important 
dates,  and  a  brief  bibliography  for  further  read 
ing.  Finally,  the  volumes  are  printed  in  a  form 
convenient  for  reading  and  for  carrying  handily 
in  the  pocket. 

SMALL,  MAYNARD  &  COMPANY,  Publishers. 


THE   BEACON    BIOGRAPHIES 

The  following  volumes  are  issued  :  — 
Louis  Agassiz,  by  ALICE  BACHE  GOULD. 
Phillips  Brooks,  by  M.  A.  DE\VOLFE  HOWE. 
John  Brown,  by  JOSEPH  EDGAR  CHAMBERLIN. 
Aaron  Burr,  by  HENRY  CHILDS  MERWIN. 
James  Fenimore  Cooper,  by  W.  B.  SHUBRICK  CLYMER. 
Stephen  Decatur,  by  CYRUS  TOWNSEND  BRADY. 
Frederick  Douglass,  by  CHARLES  W.  CHESNUTT. 
David  G.  Farragut,  by  JAMES  BARNES. 
Ulysses  S.  Grant,  by  OWEN  WISTER. 
Nathaniel  Hawthorne,  by  Mrs.  JAMES  T.  FIELDS. 
Father  Hecker,  by  HENRY  D.  SEDGWICK,  Jr. 
Sam  Houston,  by  SARAH  BARNWELL  ELLIOTT. 

"Stonewall"  Jackson,  by  CARL  HOVEY. 

Thomas  Jefferson,  by  THOMAS  E.  WATSON. 

Robert  E.  Lee,  by  WILLIAM  P.  TRENT. 

James  Russell  Lowell,  by  EDWARD  EVERETT  HALE,  Jr. 

Thomas  Paine,  by  ELLERY  SEDGWICK. 

Daniel  Webster,  by  NORMAN  HAPGOOD. 

John  Greenleaf  Whittier,  by  RICHARD  BURTON. 

The  following  are  among  those  in  preparation:  — 
John  James  Audubon,  by  JOHN  BURROUGHS. 
Edwin  Booth,  by  CHARLES  TOWNSEND  COPELAND. 
Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  by  FRANK  B.  SANBORN. 
Benjamin  Franklin,  by  LINDSAY  SWIFT. 
Alexander  Hamilton,  by  JAMES  SCHOULER. 
Henry  W.  Longfellow,  by  GEORGE  RICE  CARPENTER. 
Samuel  F.  B.  Morse,  by  JOHN  TROWBRIDGE. 


A  Companion   Series  to  the  Beacon  Biographies 

THE  WESTMINSTER   BIOG 
RAPHIES   of   Eminent   Englishmen 

The  WESTMINSTER  BIOGRAPHIES  are  uniform  in  plan, 
size,  and  general  make-up  with  the  BEACON  BIOGRAPHIES, 
the  point  of  important  difference  lying  in  the  fact  that 
they  deal  with  the  lives  of  eminent  Englishmen  instead 
of  eminent  Americans.  They  are  bound  in  limp  red  cloth, 
are  gilt-topped,  and  have  a  cover  design  and  a  vignette  title- 
page  by  BERTRAM  GROSVENOR  GOODHUE.  Like  the  Beacon 
Biographies,  each  volume  has  a  frontispiece  portrait,  a 
photogravure,  a  calendar  of  dates,  and  a  bibliography  for 
further  reading. 

The  following  volumes  are  issued:  — 
Robert  Browning,  by  ARTHUR  WAUGH. 
Daniel  Defoe,  by  WILFRED  WHITTEN. 
Adam  Duncan  (Lord  Camperdown),  by  H.  W.  WILSON. 
George  Eliot,  by  CLARA  THOMSON. 
Cardinal  Newman,  by  A.  R.  WALLER  (in  press). 
John  Wesley,  by  FRANK  BANFIELD. 

Many  others  are  in  preparation. 


SMALL,  MAYNARD  &  COMPANY,  Publishers, 
a  PIERCE  BUILDING,  Copley  Square,  BOSTON. 


~.,«  25  CENTS 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


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